Huma Siddiqui, Financial Express, India, 15 August 2006

NEW DELHI, AUG 14: During the triangular IBSA (India, Brazil and South Africa) political summit on September 13 in Brazil, Mercosur is likely to propose South African Customs Union (SACU) and India the creation of a working group to explore the modalities of a trilateral free trade agreement (T-FTA) among them.

The ministry of external affairs (MEA) officials suggested IBSA should hold a business council meeting as well in the run-up to the summit.

“Successful development of synergy within the trilateral framework could be an exemplary model for other activities in South-South Cooperation,” they added.

Garth Shelton, Lideres Regionais e Seguranca Internacional

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Council on Hemispheric Affairs, 15 March 2006

• New alliance of regional giants slowly gains strength
• India, Brazil, and South Africa (IBSA) spearheads south-south co-operation
• IBSA presses issues of poor nations’ development in WTO and UN debates
• Economic cooperation remains the largest challenge
• Only another elite debating society?

In the face of mounting pressures to develop an alternative option to globalization—one that emerges from a developing world perspective and prioritizes egalitarian advancement, technological cooperation, and an end to global marginalization of the poor nations—there has been a new push to redefine political and economic arrangements springing from Bretton Woods. One component of these many recent initiatives is the idea of south-south cooperation. This southern perspective, while not a new concept, has by no means even been partially realized.

Garth le Pere and Lyal White, 25 October 2005, The Star

"Regional agreements are not to be embraced carelessly, like teenage love affairs." These words by Pascal Lamy, the director-general of the World Trade Organisation (WTO), may have referred to regional integration in Europe but resonate clearly in the context of South Africa's ambitious pursuit of bilateral trade agreements, particularly those with strategic partners of the South.

Having concluded a preferential trade agreement with Mercosur, the South American bloc that includes Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay and a range of associate members, South Africa - under the guise of the Southern African Customs Union (Sacu) - is preparing for negotiations with both China and India.