UN WORLD DEVELOPMENT INFORMATION DAY: G20 and the BRICS Vision for Shared Prosperity
By Reginald Letsholo
24 October 2025
24 October is marked annually as World Development Information Day by the United Nations (UN), reminding us that socio-economic and industrial development is an economic process and a shared moral project. The day calls on the world to strengthen international cooperation and deepen public understanding of the interdependent nature of global progress. As the UN notes, “an essential part of the work on development consists of the mobilisation of public opinion in both developing and developed countries in support of set objectives and policies.” https://www.un.org/en/observances/development-information-day
Thus, genuine development requires honesty, participation, and solidarity across all nations, principles that will soon be tested as the world gathers for the G20 Summit in Johannesburg.
As the world turns its eyes to the inaugural 2025 G20 Johannesburg Summit (22–23 November 2025), the first time the G20-leaders convene on African soil under the presidency of Cyril Ramaphosa, we stand at a hinge moment of global realignment. South Africa’s embrace of the motto “Solidarity, Equality, Sustainability” represents a flourishing of themes that frames a powerful new architecture for how business, government and communities might converge around common purpose.
That reframing matters because at summits for diplomacy like the G20, African emerging-economies are given the opportunity to call on private industry to be a part of the circle of transformation. They are invited to interweave themselves into the way Africa and her people choose to self-actualise.
Africa has always been rich in resources, but too often remained marginalised in global decision-making.
The fact that the G20 is now convening in Johannesburg, speaks to a potential seismic shift, that the Global South is no longer waiting for the rules to change. We are asserting ownership of the agenda.
For multinational corporations like Anglo American, who have been deeply rooted in Southern Africa for well over 100 years, this matters precisely because the history of flag bearing companies is inseparable from South Africa’s national story. For most of the 20th century, Anglo was the symbol of our mining might, dominating gold, platinum and diamonds, employing hundreds of thousands, shaping not only our
economy but our politics and culture.
Today, Anglo American is taking over Canada’s Teck Resources, shifting its headquarters from London to Vancouver, and celebrating the birth of Anglo-Teck, a copper-centric global champion, promising shareholders synergies worth US$1.4 billion a year and guaranteed investment of CA$4.5 billion for Canada.
Yet in South Africa, where Anglo was founded more than a century ago, the story looks very different. It is a story of disinvestment: of life, livelihoods, land, and legacy eroded as boardrooms shift their gaze abroad.
Companies built on South African land, labour and lives that choose instead to guarantee investment to Western powers while offering little more than platitudes at home, represent business models misaligned with the spirit and ethical code of BRICS. The UN’s call for both developed and developing nations to foster public understanding and participation in development could not be more relevant here. When corporations shift their investment away from the very societies that built them, they violate not only economic logic but the moral principle of shared responsibility embedded in the UN’s vision of interdependent progress.
This is precisely why summits such as the G20 exist, to ensure that principles of transparency, accountability, and trust are not abstract ideals, but enforceable standards.
For Africa and the wider Global South, these gatherings must serve as instruments for economic correction to confront the enduring challenges of colonial entanglement and extraction. For far too long, the mineral wealth and natural endowments of Africa have been mined to disproportionately benefit economies in the West. And so, when corporations like Anglo American relocate their financial commitments abroad, they are making moral statements about whose futures they believe are worth investing in.
The upcoming Johannesburg G20 is therefore an opportunity for BRICS nations to strengthen solidarity across the board and reclaim agency, narrative, and ownership of the means of value creation. Under South Africa’s G20 presidency, BRICS nations have a chance to articulate a new compact of global responsibility that can measure economic success also by the regenerative prosperity it creates.
If we are to deliver meaningfully on ecologically conscious, equitable, and inclusive growth, then industrialisation and employment creation must align with local development outcomes. That means industry giants like Anglo must operate with transparency and in true partnership with the communities that built them. Developing nations and emerging economies deserve better than what the West has historically deemed appropriate for our people.
The Johannesburg G20, B20, Y20 and associated summits are proof that the world is moving toward a more layered and conscious model — where governments, multinationals, civil society, and international forums interlace around shared goals. The BRICS alliance is a perfect example of this evolution, advocating a diplomacy rooted in cooperation, accountability, and development.
For the executive management of Anglo American, Teck Resources, and other Western institutions, the G20’s language of solidarity, equality, and sustainability may yet be a lesson to learn.
As we reflect on World Development Information Day, it becomes clear that awareness alone is not enough, it must translate into cooperation, equity, and courage. The Johannesburg G20 offers a platform to turn words into action, to embody the UN’s call for shared participation in the development story. If we can succeed in that, the Summit will stand as proof that global consciousness and local justice can finally move
in harmony.
And that is the beauty of BRICS and of Johannesburg as host, that this alliance holds the grace to welcome all stakeholders to engage, to exchange, to learn, and to converge around a common purpose that unites us all. A purpose the UN envisioned when it declared 24 October as World Development Information Day: the awakening of public conscience for the collective advancement of people and planet.
Reginald Letsholo is a youth development activist and works with civil society originations from various sectors in South Africa, including mining affected communities. Letsholo has a Bachelor of Commerce (BCom) in Marketing and Management Science from IMM Graduate School of Marketing. He is a Co-Founder of the Tlou Mogale Foundation.