Report by Shuchi Giridhar
The 2025 G20 summit recently took place on 23rd and 24th November. The G20 Presidency of this year was taken over by South Africa hence the summit was held in Johannesburg by President Cyril Ramaphosa.
Who attended?
The states that attended this year’s summit held in South Africa were Algeria, Egypt, Ethiopia ,Finland, Ireland ,Malaysia, Netherlands, Nigeria, Norway, Portugal, Qatar, Sierra Leone, Singapore, Spain, Switzerland, United Arab Emirates, Vietnam
Other international bodies in attendance were AFDB, CAF, FSB, FAO, IDB, ILO, IMF, LAS, NDB, UN, UNCTAD, UNESCO, World Bank, WHO, WTO.
The US was also invited but refused to send their representative.
What is the theme for this summit?
This year’s theme chosen by South Africa for its presidency was Solidarity, Equality, Sustainability. Solidarity is indicative of cooperation across diverse economies. Equality denotes the presence of fair opportunities between and within countries. Sustainability is for long term development that benefits future generations rather than compromising them.
What happened?
• The G20 adopted a declaration on its first day, prior the first session, to address the climate crisis and other global challenges. Emphasis was placed on the creation of a G20 Critical Minerals Framework by which critical minerals would be used for sustainable development and inclusive economic growth.
• Session-1 – The first session was “Inclusive and Sustainable Economic Growth that Leaves No One Behind”. It took place on 22nd November 2025, the first day of the summit. In the session emphasis was laid on the importance of G20 and sharing responsibility, acting in a coordinated manner to ensure inclusive and sustainable global growth while facing various challenges concerning the international community and rising uncertainty over the global economy. The work done by the group under South African presidency in the areas of skilled migration, tourism, food security, AI, digital economy, innovation and women empowerment was appreciated by PM Narendra Modiji.
• Session-2
The second session also took place on 22nd November. 1 .The topic for the session was “A Resilient World – G20’s Contribution”. The need for the G20 to lead international efforts to counter global problems such as disasters, climate change, environment, global health, energy and food security. During this session PM Narendra Modi ji called for greater collective action on the climate agenda to strengthen food security by highlighting the Deccan Principles of food security adopted during India’s G20 Presidency.
• Session-3
2 .The third session was on the following day, 23rd November and was on the topic “A fair and a Just Future for All”. This session had many members pointing out that strengthening and diversifying supply-chains for critical minerals was crucial for the growth of the global economy, and that international cooperation on AI was very important. PM Modiji called for a fundamental change in the method of promotion of critical technologies. He added that such technologies must be ‘human-centric’ and aim to better the human experience rather than ‘finance-centric’. He noted that technologies must be ‘global’ instead of ‘national’, and based on ‘open source’ rather than on ‘exclusive models.
PM Modi’s six proposals
Our country’s prime minister Shri Narendra Modi ji had presented 6 initiatives in the G20 summit to ensure the sustainable global growth especially aimed at the Global South. They are-
1) G20-Africa Skills Multiplier Initiative: the aim of this initiative is to train one million African trainers to increase employment opportunities and improve socio-economic development all over the continent
2) Global Traditional Knowledge Repository: Aims to document and share sustainable living practices found in traditional wisdom while encouraging citizens to lead action against the climate crisis.
3) G20 Initiative to Counter the Drug-Terror Nexus: this is focused on enhanced intelligence sharing, collaborative operations, and cross-border monitoring to address the link between drug trafficking and global terrorism.
4) Global Healthcare Response Teams: Includes forming of international teams of trained medical experts from G20 nations to be immediately deployed during global health emergencies, such as pandemics or natural disasters.
5) New Parameters of Development : This advocates for a new development model which is based on a holistic view of humans, society, and nature called “Integral Humanism” to address the imbalance of growth and excess use of natural resources.
6) Global Cooperation in Agriculture and Food Security: Highlights India’s efforts to address climate change impacts on food security, including promoting climate-resilient millets (“Shree Anna”) and shares the best practices from its large-scale food security and health insurance programs.