The 17th G20 Summit will take place in Bali, Indonesia, on November 15–16, 2022. The G20 or group of 20 comprises the world’s most developed and industrialized nations; Argentina, Canada, Australia, France, Germany, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, South Korea, Turkey, the UK and the US, EU as well as the fast-growing developing economies such as China, Brazil, and India. It serves as the main discussion platform for issues regarding global, economic, and financial cooperation.
The G20 countries account for 85% of the world’s economic output and 75% of world trade.
Every year a different G20 member state is appointed for the presidency and is responsible for setting the agenda for discussion, this year’s Indonesian G20 Presidency Global will be focusing on; Health Architecture, Digital Transformation, and Sustainable Energy Transition. The Summit will also focus on the work carried out within the Ministerial Meetings, Working Groups, and Engagement Groups of the G20 process throughout the year.
“The G20 countries have agreed to accelerate energy transition including to ensure achievement of the sustainable global development targets by 2030, particularly on the access to reliable, sustainable, and affordable modern energy for all,” stated Yudo Dwinanda Priaadi, Senior Advisor on Strategic Planning Division of the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources.
In terms of who will attend or not, the G20 summit is still a highly anticipated event because political unrest may obscure the conference’s fundamental objective. It would be interesting to see if US President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping, who have been in a downward spiral for the past two years because of their differing stance on trade policy, human rights, Ukraine, and Taiwan, engage or decide to hold any talks when they meet for the first time in person at the conference.
However, U.S. President Joe Biden said on Sunday his country will maintain open communication lines and seek no conflict with China, ahead of what are expected to be tense talks on a range of geopolitical issues at the G20 summit in Indonesia this week.
British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak will also be attending his debut G20 summit and has urged world powers to unite against exploitation of the global economy by “malign actors.”
Developing nations must have access to credit for economic growth without becoming reliant on “exploitative” lenders, Sunak is expected to tell the summit, echoing past G7 criticism of China. Furthermore, he stated that “This G20 summit will not be business as usual. We will call out Putin’s regime, and lay bare their utter contempt for the kind of international cooperation and respect for sovereignty forums like the G20 represent.
Other world leaders in attendance include Indonesian president Joko Widodo, Canadian PM Justin Trudeau, Japanese PM Fumio Kishida, Indian PM Narendra Modi, Australian PM Anthony Albanese, South Korean president Yoon Suk-Yeol, German chancellor Olaf Scholz, French president Emmanuel Macron, South African president Cyril Ramaphosa, Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Argentina’s president Alberto Fernandez, Mexican foreign minister Marcelo Ebrard and Italian PM Giorgia Meloni. Jair Bolosonaro, the outgoing Brazilian president, will not arrive. The EU will be represented by Ursula von der Leyen and Charles Michel.
Russian President Vladimir Putin will not attend the summit amid the war with Ukraine but he will send Russia’s foreign minister Sergei Lavrov to represent. The Russian Embassy in Indonesia also confirmed last week that Putin would not be present. The Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has also been invited and will most likely be attending virtually, though the country is not a member.
Despite the meeting’s optimistic slogan, “Recover Together, Recover Stronger,” the chances of cooperation at the first summit since the invasion of Ukraine are limited given the US and its allies’ differences with China and Russia. However, the President of the Republic of Indonesia, Joko Widodo, told the Financial Times that the G-20 is meant to be a forum for discussion of economics and development rather than politics.
The summit is the biggest gathering by a group of leaders since the start of the coronavirus pandemic and an opportunity for national leaders to meet and hold one-on-one meetings to address and resolve issues.
