BRICS is an acronym for an association of five major fast-growing economies: Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. Mr. Vladimir V. Putin, President of the Russian Federation, initiated the Association in 2006, and initially it was known as BRIC, before the joining of South Africa in 2001.
Five BRICS countries represent 45% of the world population; occupy 30% of the Earth’s territory with a combined nominal GDP of 25% of the world GDP (measured in PPP of national currencies).
The Association has held annual summits of the heads of states since 2009. The BRIC first formal summit was held in Yekaterinburg, Russia, in June 2009. First five-member summit took place in 2011, in China. The most recent BRICS summit took place in Fortaleza, Brazil, in July 2014.
There are other high-level formats of BRICS interaction. Among them are the Meetings of Foreign Ministers, Meetings of High Representatives, responsible for national security affairs, Meetings of Ministers of Finance and Central Bankers, Meetings of Ministers of Health, Agriculture, and of Heads of Statistical Agencies.
BRICS Tax Administrations Interaction
In April 2012, a meeting of BRICS Finance Ministers took place in Washington on sidelines of G20. The parties agreed to enhance cooperation and common approaches of BRICS countries to the issues of international taxation, transfer pricing, prevention of tax avoidance and exchange of information. This resulted in the first meeting of the Heads of BRICS tax authorities, which took place in January 2013 in New Delhi, India. The meeting’s participants sighed a Communique on the enhancement of cooperation on tax administration matters.
Besides, in May 2013 there was a meeting of BRICS Heads of Tax Administrations on sidelines of the Forum on Tax Administration of the Organization for Economic and Social Development in Moscow, Russia.
The main topic of the discussion was the establishment of a special BRICS structure for tax administrations’ interaction.