The calendar of important events and releases in June has been quite hectic. One of the most important events is without a doubt this week’s meeting of the Group of Seven - the most powerful economies in the world. This is the first G7 in-person meeting since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic, and also the first meeting where the United States is led by President Joe Biden.
Quite predictably, the global pandemic is one of the key issues that G7 countries are going to discuss. While there have been massive improvements in the pandemic in the developed world, and G7 countries are largely free of Covid-19, the same cannot be said for the rest of the world. Developing economies like India, Turkey, and Brazil have continued to wrestle with the coronavirus despite ongoing vaccination campaigns, while many countries, especially in Africa, South America, and Asia have not had a single dose of any of the available Covid-19 vaccines.
Thus, the challenge is upon G7 countries, which bought the majority of vaccine doses before they were even manufactured and secured enough doses to cover their own populations many times over. Now they need to do their best to donate their surplus vaccines to countries that couldn’t afford them when the pandemic began and did not manage to sign contracts with any pharmaceutical companies. The nations are instead relying on initiatives like the UN-run Covax program to get vaccine donations from richer countries.
Ahead of the meeting, Joe Biden announced that the United States will be donating 500 million doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine in August. It is expected that other G7 leaders will follow suit and announce their own donations in turn, securing a large pool of vaccines in a shared effort to supply the countries that got excluded from the first stage of vaccine distribution.
This is important because it will ensure the whole world is better prepared to deal with the pandemic and will increase the chances of eradicating Covid-19 globally, which will allow the global economy to return back to normal.
Another important topic that is likely going to be discussed is China. Though China is the second-largest economy in the world, it is not “invited” to be part of the Group of Seven. Still, China’s actions in recent years have sparked a lot of criticism internationally, for example, its actions in Hong Kong, where the Chinese government has successfully eroded the city-state’s relative autonomy.
Many countries have various issues with China. Aside from human rights violations, trade is another sore point, as China is seen to be undercutting the competition in such a way that many countries are extremely dependent on it. Australia, who is not a G7 member but was invited to attend the summit, is one of the states that have called for a reform of the World Trade Organization’s rules in order to create a more even playing field for international trade.
The United States has been the most vocal about China, a trend that started under Donald Trump’s time as POTUS, but that seems so important and pervasive that even someone as diametrically opposed to Trump as Biden has seen fit to continue America’s hard stance against China. Biden has kept some of Trump’s sanctions against China in place and has been vocal about forging an alliance with the rest of the G7 and other traditional “allies” of the United States to coordinate their actions against China and to a certain extent Russia as well. Russia will prop up as another interesting point of discussion soon, as Biden has a scheduled meeting with Vladimir Putin on June 16.
