The first meeting of the BRICS environment ministers constitutes an important step in the process of enhancing leading emerging economies’ cooperation on environmental protection. In late April, the environment ministers of the so-called BRICS countries – namely Russia, China, Brazil, India and South Africa – gathered in Moscow to discuss the terms of an agreement that would deepen the countries’ ties on environmental protection, waste management and green growth. They also talked about feasible ways to increase the use of renewable energies. According to the ministers, in the future “the group will study the possibility of creating a joint BRICS platform for exchanging best practices and environmentally clean technology and know-how”. This has been the first meeting between environment ministers planned under the BRICS banner, and has been deservedly hailed as a major initiative, but the Indian environment minister Prakash Javadekar also highlighted that help and support coming from developed countries will be critical to ensure the success of the BRICS group’s project; in fact, the minister stated that “technology development, technology transfer and finance are important for developing world in taking more robust actions”, and “the cooperation of the developed world is needed in this respect as the cumulative efforts of the world and out joint actions will impact the climate in a positive way”. As Achim Steiner, head of UNEP, has noted, developing countries now play a fundamental and substantial role in ensuring sustainable development, especially the ones with rapidly developing financial and capital markets. With regard to this matter, in March 2015 the UN Environment Programme issued a research showing that developing countries are close to taking the lead in investments in the clean energy sector, especially thanks to the Chinese and Indian rapidly growing solar sectors. In 2010, the five countries of the BRICS group accounted for nearly 40% of the global amount of greenhouse gas emissions, China alone being responsible for 22%. The gLAWcal Team POREEN project Monday, 27 April 2015 (Source: RTCC)