G20 Summit – 2023

G20 Summit – 2023

Blog Credit: Trupti Thakur

Image Courtesy: Google

 

The said summit is a three-day event to be held from May 22 to May 24. The G20 Tourism Working Group meeting is the first major international event after Jammu and Kashmir’s special status was scrapped in 2019. Jammu and Kashmir’s Srinagar is all set to host the third G20 Tourism Working Group meeting on Monday.

Countries in G20:

The G20 comprises nineteen countries and the European Union (EU). The twenty (20) members are: Argentina.

 

The Group of Twenty (G20) comprises 19 countries :

• United States
• France
• United Kingdom
• Italy
• Germany
• Canada
• Japan
• Russia
• India
• China
• Brazil
• Argentina
• Australia
• Indonesia
• Republic of Korea
• Mexico
• Saudi Arabia
• South Africa
• Türkiye
• The European Union.

 

 

 

At G20 meeting, Minister Calls for Private Investment to Transform India into Premier Tourist Destination

The meeting is the first significant international event in Kashmir since the abrogation of Article 370 in 2019. Earlier, the delegates were accorded a warm welcome as they arrived in Srinagar for the meeting. The three-day G20 Summit, from May 22-24 G20 will focus on five key priority areas: Green Tourism, Digitalization, Skills, MSMEs and Destination Management.

 

Agenda of G20 Summit 2023:

Under the Indian Presidency, the G20 in 2023 will focus on the theme, ‘One Earth, One Family, One Future’. The theme affirms the value of human, animal, plant, and microorganisms and their interconnectedness on planet Earth and in the wider universe.

 

Theme

The theme of India’s G20 Presidency – “Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam” or “One Earth. One Family. One Future” – is drawn from the ancient Sanskrit text of the Maha Upanishad.

 

 

 

Which state will host the G20 summit 2023 India?

India’s G20 Presidency:

India will convene the G20 Leaders’ Summit for the first time in 2023, as 43 Heads of Delegations- the largest ever in the G20–will participate in the final New Delhi Summit in September later this year.

 

 

Guest Countries of G20 2023:

Under India’s Presidency, nine countries — Bangladesh, Egypt, Mauritius, Netherlands, Nigeria, Oman, Singapore, Spain and the United Arab Emirates — have been invited to be the “guest countries” in a year when the G20 is struggling to strike a balance between the agenda of the western countries and that of the Global one.

The “nine guest countries” to the G20 summit and ministerial meetings are expected to bring their own plans to the events but they will be ultimately guided by the “continuity” of G20, a source familiar with the planning of the summit has informed. Under India’s Presidency, nine countries — Bangladesh, Egypt, Mauritius, Netherlands, Nigeria, Oman, Singapore, Spain and the United Arab Emirates — have been invited to be the “guest countries” in a year when the G20 is struggling to strike a balance between the agenda of the western countries and that of the Global South.

“The invitee countries are like any other participants of G20. This is an opportunity for these countries to come and be an equal partner in the G20 process. We will not create preconditions for countries saying ‘don’t bring this or that’ but G20 has a certain agenda. G20 has a continuity as the summit represents a continuous process that has run through many Presidencies,” said the source emphasising that the G20 lays seeds for actionable policy and therefore the “invitee countries” are also expected to play an important role in the summit without in anyway derailing it.

The agenda of this year’s G20 summit is in the early stage and the ideas are being “socialised”, said the official. The evident caution regarding the ideas is partly fuelled by the intense differences that have been generated by the division among the leading members of the group because of the Ukraine crisis.

Already, ahead of the summit, countries like the UAE, Egypt, Bangladesh have boosted diplomatic activities, indicating that they wish to use the gathering in India for respective foreign policy goals as well. During last week’s visit to Dhaka, Foreign Secretary Vinay Mohan Kwatra was told about Dhaka’s interest in becoming a non-permanent member at the UN Security Council. In the coming months, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina is expected to take this idea to multiple foreign partners of Dhaka. Similarly, continued Israeli actions in the recent weeks against the Palestinians have increased bilateral irritation with Egypt. Similarly, Netherlands is expected to raise the Ukraine issue forcefully. These angles have attracted attention of the G20 watchers about what the “guest countries” will bring to the table on their own.

 

 

Governance issues:

The agenda of the G20 has so far remained a strongly contested matter with two different groups demanding differing subjects to be highlighted. While the western block in G20 led by the U.S. and the U.K. are expectedly focused on cornering Russia the other side is determined not to allow the event to become an anti-Russia meeting. The broad approach that is emerging across a majority of members is that the “governance issues that are not being addressed in the United Nations and other multilateral forums should be taken up at the New Delhi G20”.

Accordingly, the commodities crisis, price rise, energy price rise, debt restructuring — issues that have intensified in the backdrop of the Ukraine war since February 2022 are likely to find attention of the bulk of the members. A good test of this evolving agenda-forming discussion will be apparent in Bengaluru where the meeting of the Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors will take place on Friday to be followed by the foreign ministers’ meeting in March (1-2), which will be the biggest diplomatic event of the outfit before the summit of the heads of states and governments in September.

A sign of the western focus was evident in U.S. Treasury Secretary Jannet Yellen’s comments in Bengaluru on Thursday when she pledged to bump up economic support to Ukraine by $10 billion while coming down heavily on Russia’s military campaign. The meeting of the Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors (FMCBG) to be chaired by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and Reserve Bank of India Governor Shaktikanta Das is being keenly watched here as it will be held on February 24, which marks the first anniversary of Russia’s attack on Ukraine.

The FMCBG meet is likely to give a hint to the foreign ministers’ meeting in New Delhi during March 1-2 but it is understood that the coming summit aims to strike a balance where all compelling issues will be addressed without overshadowing the economic issues that are posing a tough challenge before the countries of the Global South. A source indicated that the issues that are closer to the Global South will not be allowed to be overshadowed by western insistence on a particular European matter.

 

Blog By: Trupti Thakur