About G7

• The Group of Seven (G7) is a collective of seven of the world’s most industrialized and developed economies. Their political leaders come together annually to discuss important global economic, political, social and security issues.
• The G7 member countries are the United States, Britain, France, Japan, Germany, Italy, and Canada. 
• Russia belonged to the forum from 1998 through 2014, when the bloc was known as the G8, but was suspended following its annexation of Crimea.
• India is not a member of the G-7 grouping.

 

Background:

• The origins of the group date back to the early 1970s, when leaders of the U.S., U.K., France, West Germany, Italy, and Japan met informally in Paris to discuss the then recession and oil crisis. 
• Over the years, new members joined, starting with Canada in 1976, and then Russia in 1997 before being ejected in 2014.

 

Objectives of G7

• The major purpose of the G-7 is to discuss and sometimes act in concert to help resolve global problems, with a special focus on economic issues.
• The group has discussed financial crises, monetary systems, and major world crises such as oil shortages.

 

The limitations of G7

The success of multilateral institutions are judged by the standard of whether or not they have successfully addressed the core global or regional challenges of the time.

 

• Failed to handle 2008 economic crisis

 

• • The G7 failed to head off the economic downturn of 2007-08, which led to the rise of the G20.
  • In the short span of its existence, the G20 has provided a degree of confidence, by promoting open markets, and stimulus, preventing a collapse of the global financial system.

 

 

• Failed to address contemporary issues

 

• • The G7 has failed to cover contemporary issues, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change, the challenge of the Daesh, and the crisis of state collapse in West Asia.

 

 

• No action plan to phase out fossil fuels

 

• • It had announced its members would phase out all fossil fuels and subsidies, but has not so far announced any plan of action to do so.
  • The G7 countries account for 59% of historic global CO2 emissions (“from 1850 to 2010”), and their coal fired plants emit “twice more CO2 than those of the entire African continent”.

 

Need for a new institution

• Nations need dexterity and resilience to cope with the state of disorder the world is facing now due to the stalled  global economy and inevitable distress caused by COVID-19.
• Revival of multilateralism can help nations as  they have been seeking national solutions for problems that are unresolvable internally. However existing international institutions have proven themselves unequal to these tasks.
• Hence a new mechanism might help in attenuating them.

 

What needs to be done?

• It would be ideal to include in the new institution, the seven future leading economies, plus Germany, Japan, the U.K., France, Mexico, Turkey, South Korea, and Australia.
• The 2005 ad hoc experiment by Prime Minister Tony Blair in bringing together the G7 and the BRICS countries was a one-off.

 

What will be India’s interest?

• A new international mechanism will have value only if it focuses on key global issues.
• India would be vitally interested in the following issues:
  • International trade
  • Climate change
  • COVID-19 crisis
  • To ensure effective implementation of the 1975 Biological Weapons Convention
  • Counter-terrorism and counter-proliferation.
  • Regional issues
    • Establishing an agreement on peaceful coexistence with Iran would be important to ensure that it does not acquire nuclear weapons and is able to contribute to peace and stability in Afghanistan, the Gulf and West Asia.
    • The end state in Afghanistan would also be of interest to India
    • Reduction of tensions in the Korean Peninsula and the South China Sea.

 

Why in the news?

The next G7 summit, tentatively scheduled in Washington DC in mid-June, has been postponed by the host, U.S. President Donald Trump.

 

News in detail:

• While postponing the summit Mr. Trump declared that in any case, the G7 “is a very outdated group of countries” and no longer properly represented “what’s going on in the world”.
• He raised a question if we can have a G10 or G11 instead, with the inclusion of India, South Korea, Australia and possibly Russia.

 

 

References:

https://www.investopedia.com/terms/g/g7.asp#:~:text=Role%20of%20the%20Group%20of,crises%20such%20as%20oil%20shortages.

https://www.thehindu.com/opinion/lead/an-unravelling-of-the-group-of-seven/article31798577.ece