G7 Summit

Prime Minister Modi has left for Germany to attend the G7 Summit. This year’s G7 Summit will be held under the German Presidency on 26-27 June 2022.

Key highlights of this summit –

• Theme of this year’s G7 summit is – Progress towards an equitable world
• Five major goals of current G7 Summit —
  • • Strong alliances for a sustainable planet
    • Setting the course for economic stability and transformation
    • Enhanced preparedness for healthy lives
    • Sustainable investments in better future
    • Stronger together
• Other countries invited —
  • • Besides India, Germany has also invited other democracies such as Argentina, Indonesia, Senegal and South Africa to the G7 Summit.
    • This is to strengthen international collaboration on important global issues impacting humanity.

Origin –

• The origin of G7 lies in the oil shocks of 1973 and the corresponding financial crisis.
• In order to address the situation after oil shock, the heads of the world’s six leading industrial nations decided to hold a meeting in 1975.
• These six nations were – the US, UK, France, Germany (West), Japan and Italy.
• These countries were joined by Canada in 1976 and G7 came into existence.
• Current members — US, UK, Canada, France, Germany, Italy and Japan are the current members of this group. The European Union is also represented within the G7.

Purpose of G7 –

• To determine the course of multilateral discourse
• To shape political responses to global challenges.
• Basically, G7 provides a platform to discuss and coordinate solutions to major global issues, especially in the areas of trade, security, economics, and climate change.

Powers of G7 –

• The G7 is not based on a treaty and has no permanent secretariat or office. The agenda of G7 is set by the presiding nation.
• It cannot pass any laws because it is made up of separate nations with their own democratic processes.
• However, decisions taken by G7 have global effects as the member countries are political and economic heavyweights.

India’s participation in G7 –

• Since 2014, this is the third time the Prime Minister will be participating in a G7 meeting.
• India had been invited by the G7 French presidency in 2019 to the Biarritz Summit as a “Goodwill Partner”.
• India was also invited at the 47th G7 Summit held under the presidency of UK.
• The US under President Donald Trump had extended an invitation to India in May 2020. However, due to the pandemic and the US election outcome, that did not happen.
• During Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s tenure, India attended the G8 Summit five times. In March 2014, Russia was indefinitely suspended following the annexation of Crimea, reducing G8 to G7.