The President of South Africa, Cyril Ramaphosa, pledged to use the country's G20 presidency to draw the group's attention to the development of Africa and the Global South.
"We will use this moment to bring the development priorities of the African Continent and the Global South more firmly onto the agenda of the G20," he said at the media briefing.
The South African president also highlighted improving disaster resilience, ensuring debt sustainability for low-income countries, financing the energy transition in developing economies, and ensuring a fair distribution of mining profits as priorities.
Ramaphosa promised to establish working groups within the G20 on inclusive economic development, food security, artificial intelligence, and innovation.
Moreover, the republic assumed the presidency at a time when the world is facing numerous threats and challenges, including geopolitical ones, and will make every effort to jointly solve these problems, said Ramaphosa.
“Across the world, billions of people are affected by underdevelopment, inequality, poverty, hunger and unemployment. The outlook for global economic growth remains subdued, and many economies carry the burden of unsustainable levels of debt. Geopolitical instability, conflict and war are causing further hardship and suffering. This is all happening at a time of great technological change, which presents both opportunities and risk,” he stated.
During its presidency, South Africa will host over 130 events in various formats and at various levels. Among them will be four meetings of heads of finance ministries and central banks, two meetings of G20 foreign ministers— the first of which will take place in February. The culmination will be the G20 summit in Johannesburg, preliminarily scheduled for November 21-22, 2025.
G20 agenda issues are addressed in 22 sectoral working groups and at forums representing the interests of member parliaments, businesses, the scientific community, women, youth, and civil society. South Africa also plans to establish a G20 media forum. South Africa's presidency will end on November 30, 2025, and will be handed over to the United States.