Monday 14 / September / 2026
New Delhi: India’s BRICS chairship has produced a wide-ranging set of initiatives covering counterterrorism, digital public infrastructure, artificial intelligence, health security, trade, taxation, energy, climate resilience and law-enforcement cooperation, according to the official 2026 factsheet on outcomes and initiatives.
India's 2026 BRICS chairship delivered over 50 practical, development-oriented initiatives structured around four core pillars: resilience, innovation, cooperation, and sustainability
The initiatives have been organised under four pillars of India’s chairship — resilience, innovation, cooperation and sustainability — alongside a separate programme of people-to-people engagements involving academics, diplomats, scientists, youth, cultural practitioners and parliamentarians.
Under the resilience pillar, BRICS members have agreed to strengthen cooperation in areas ranging from agroecology and regenerative agriculture to combating synthetic drugs and transnational organised crime.
The anti-drug initiative focuses on synthetic drugs, new psychoactive substances and the diversion of precursor chemicals. It envisages early-warning mechanisms and information-sharing arrangements to help member countries identify and respond to emerging threats.
The resilience agenda also includes guidelines for integrating early-warning data into disaster management and voluntary principles for climate-resilient urban infrastructure. The disaster-management framework seeks to strengthen risk assessment, forecasting and the dissemination of timely warnings, while the urban infrastructure principles aim to incorporate climate and disaster risks into planning and reinforce the resilience of interconnected infrastructure systems.
Health security has also emerged as a key component of the resilience agenda. BRICS has established a sub-working group on an integrated early-warning system for preventing and responding to mass infectious diseases.
An operational framework will seek to connect national public health institutes as centres of excellence in surveillance, laboratory systems, data analytics, workforce development and applied research.
Trade cooperation forms another important part of the agenda. Outcomes include a workplan for the internationalisation of micro, small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) and a shared understanding on global value chains.
The global value-chain initiative envisages a BRICS Global Value Chain Action Plan for 2026-2030, supported by mechanisms including a Technical Council, BRICS Connect and a joint study. A logistics and supply-chain cooperation framework has also been proposed to improve multimodal connectivity and coordination among member countries.
Under the innovation pillar, considerable emphasis has been placed on digital technologies and artificial intelligence. A BRICS network on digital agriculture is expected to promote AI-driven decision-support systems, geospatial intelligence, IoT-enabled monitoring and advanced data analytics.
Another initiative proposes using AI-enabled visual identification and matching technologies to help trace missing and stolen cultural objects that enter circulation through auctions, heritage markets, exhibitions and other channels.
BRICS is also exploring voluntary cross-border digital public infrastructure projects, particularly among countries that already possess established capabilities in the field.
To strengthen entrepreneurship and access to finance, a proposed BRICS Startup Innovation Fund aims to address funding gaps faced by startups, while a BRICS Incubator Network will connect incubators and national nodal agencies to expand market access and support innovation-driven enterprises.
The innovation pillar also includes a BRICS Science and Research Repository designed to map and share research outputs, datasets, infrastructure and expertise. Other initiatives include a Youth Startup Platform and a 2026-2030 action plan for research infrastructure and megascience projects.
The research-infrastructure plan is intended to operationalise the BRICS Global Research Advanced Infrastructure Network and support large-scale scientific research infrastructure and megascience initiatives.
Under the cooperation pillar, BRICS has created or advanced mechanisms with a stronger institutional and law-enforcement focus. These include a repository on informal cooperation for tracing fugitive offenders, a network of law-enforcement practitioners and the operationalisation of an expert network on asset recovery.
These mechanisms are intended to facilitate informal information exchanges among member countries and complement existing formal extradition and international cooperation arrangements.
Counterterrorism cooperation has also been specifically identified among the outcomes, reinforcing the bloc’s focus on coordinated responses to transnational security threats.
Overall, the outcomes reflect an effort to broaden BRICS cooperation beyond traditional economic coordination, with India’s 2026 chairship placing greater emphasis on resilience, technological innovation, institutional cooperation and sustainable development.
