Back in 2018 an article authored by myself for the Valdai club advanced the concept of PEAKS/InPEAKs as the next generation of BRICS economies – Indonesia, Pakistan, Egypt, Argentina and Kazakhstan. In the beginning of 2023 this PEAKS concept was extended to include Saudi Arabia in expectation of the BRICS enlargement that was to be discussed at the BRICS summit in South Africa in August 2023. The main idea behind the concept of InPEAKS was to include the second-largest or the largest economies from the regions of the first generation of BRICS members – Latin America (Brazil), Africa (South Africa), South Asia (India), Central Asia/EAEU (Russia), East Asia (China). The resulting InPEAKS group of emerging markets delineated the contours of BRICS enlargement for the coming years, a process that was meant to combine the economic and regional weight of invited economies with the need for them to represent the key regions of the Global South.
As things stand today after the expansion in BRICS membership in 2023-2025, this idea of the regional derivatives of core BRICS economies becoming the next wave of EMs to join the bloc appears to have largely come to pass – 4 out of 6 InPEAKS were invited to join the core: Indonesia and Egypt are now core BRICS members, Kazakhstan that opted not to apply for full core membership is a member of the BRICS partnership belt, Saudi Arabia and Argentina have the status of invited countries, with Saudi Arabia actively participating in the key BRICS/BRICS+ meetings and Argentina opting to stay outside of BRICS after the presidential elections of 2023. Pakistan, while not a member of the BRICS core or the partnership belt has applied for NDB membership and is contemplating further steps to develop its cooperation with the BRICS group.
In advancing the InPEAKS/PEAKS concept, the expectation was that with greater incorporation of this second generation of BRICS into the BRICS+ circle, there would accordingly be closer ties forged by BRICS not only with individual economies, but also the regions and the regional integration arrangements that these economies represent. This appears to have transpired most notably with respect to the region of Southeast Asia and the ASEAN regional bloc as after the accession of Indonesia as a full-fledged member in the beginning of 2025, some of the most dynamic ASEAN economies such as Vietnam joined its regional counterparts – Thailand and Malaysia – in the BRICS partnership belt.
Apart from attempting to forecast the next wave/generation of BRICS members, we have also sought to discern the next generation of EM growth outperformers in the coming decades. In 2023 we advanced the concept of VIBEs – Vietnam, India, Brazil and Emirates (UAE) – as the likely group of outperformers across EM in terms of GDP growth rates. While it may be too early to make sweeping conclusions on the quality of our EM top-picks, it may be instructive to look at the record of the past several years as a possible sign of things to come.
In 2024 Brazil posted one of the highest growth rates in South America with GDP expanding by 3.4%, while Vietnam was among the global leaders and a top performer in ASEAN, with GDP surging by more than 7%. The economy of UAE grew at a respectable (though not stratospheric) rate of 4% in 2024 and India (6.5%) had one of the highest growth rates globally and the highest in South Asia. Preliminary data for 2025 suggests that the VIBEs continued to outperform globally, though Brazil slowed down to a GDP growth rate of 2.2-2.4%. At the same time, India’s growth notably accelerated to 7.4% in FY 2025-26, while Vietnam recorded one of the highest growth rates globally (and one of the highest in its recent history) of more than 8%. UAE’s growth also accelerated from 4% to around 5%, with global projections not excluding a further acceleration in growth in the coming years.
The IMF’s growth projections for 2026 suggest that these trends across VIBEs are likely to largely persist, with Brazil facing the most significant headwinds to higher growth due to the combination of high public debt, fiscal gaps and elevated interest rate levels. We continue to observe a rising number of landlocked economies outperforming global growth – in 2026 the Fund projects that 6 such economies will be on the top-10 list of the fastest growing countries in the world. We note in particular the consistently strong performance of landlocked economies that are positioned between the largest BRICS economies of China and India (Bhutan (7.4% growth in 2026) and Nepal (5.2%)) as well as between China and Russia (Kyrgyzstan (5.3%), Uzbekistan (6%), Tajikistan (5.5%)). With the economic cooperation within the BRICS troika of China, Russia and India on the rise, the landlocked Central Asia region is emerging as one of the most dynamic parts of the global economy – perhaps even yet another candidate to emulate the admirable growth performance of ASEAN/Southeast Asia.
PS: perhaps one omission in the PEAKs and the VIBEs concepts was the economic phenomenon of Bangladesh – one of the most dynamic economies in South Asia that is expected to rival India’s growth rates in the coming years. It is currently positioned to further expand its cooperation with BRICS – in 2021 it became the first economy from outside of the BRICS core to join the BRICS NDB Bank. Its strategic positioning close to India, China and ASEAN creates a favorable environment for sustaining high growth rates via trade and investment alliances in the region.
Yaroslav Lissovolik is the Founder of BRICS+ Analytics.
