Prime Minister Narendra Modi met Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed Ali on the sidelines of the 18th BRICS Summit in New Delhi from 12-13 September, 2026, as Ethiopia leaned harder on its place in the African Union and BRICS to demand a larger role in global governance. The meeting, coming less than a year after Modi’s visit to Addis Abeba in December 2025, showed how the machinery of state power keeps recasting old relationships as strategic partnerships while ordinary people are told this is progress.
Who Gets to Speak for Africa
Addis Abeba is emerging as a central meeting point for African diplomacy, but not because people in the streets suddenly gained more say. Ethiopia’s capital matters because it hosts the African Union, and because Ethiopia sits at the intersection of African politics, the Horn of Africa and the wider Global South. India has argued that Africa should not merely be discussed in institutions of global governance but should help shape them. That line surfaced when India championed permanent membership for the African Union during its G20 presidency. Ethiopia’s full membership in BRICS and the New Delhi Declaration’s support for Ethiopia’s accession to the World Trade Organization add more institutional weight to the same top-down game.
The relationship between India and Ethiopia reaches back roughly two millennia, when the Aksumite world traded through the Red Sea port of Adulis with merchants from India. Indian teachers and merchants later became part of Ethiopia’s economic and social landscape, and formal diplomatic relations were established in 1950, with Ethiopia becoming the first African country to open an embassy in New Delhi. The old routes are still being used, only now the cargo is influence, capital and access.
Trade, Investment and the Usual Winners
Indian companies are among the top three foreign investors in Ethiopia, with more than 675 Indian companies registered with the Ethiopian Investment Commission and investments exceeding $6.5 billion. India is also Ethiopia’s second-largest trading partner. Bilateral trade stood at $550.19 million in 2024/25, including $476.81 million in Indian exports and $73.38 million in imports. Those numbers tell their own story: a relationship deep enough for big money, but still shaped by who controls the terms.
The New Delhi talks ranged from defence and investment to healthcare, critical minerals, clean energy and capacity building. That’s the language of statecraft and corporate expansion, where development gets packaged as opportunity and the people at the bottom are expected to absorb the consequences. The article says trade remains modest relative to the size and potential of the two countries, whose combined population exceeds 1.5 billion. So the answer from above is more integration, more investment, more institutional choreography.
The piece also says the economic relationship needs to move beyond the conventional structure of commerce between developing economies. Pharmaceuticals can become healthcare partnerships, agricultural trade can lead to food processing and farm technology collaboration, mineral cooperation can incorporate local value addition, and digital engagement can strengthen domestic capabilities rather than simply create another market for technology. That’s the promise. The question is who actually controls the value, and who gets left with the raw deal.
What They Call Development
India’s relevance, the article says, lies not in presenting a finished development model. Its own transformation remains a work in progress. Its experience is valuable because it has attempted to deliver digital infrastructure, affordable medicines, financial inclusion, skills and public services at an enormous scale under constraints familiar to many developing societies. Ethiopia, the article adds, should not be viewed simply as a destination for Indian capital. Its demographic scale, manufacturing ambitions, agricultural potential and diplomatic position make it a partner with capabilities and opportunities of its own.
This is where BRICS faces its real test, according to the piece. Expansion has made the grouping more representative, but numbers alone cannot make an institution consequential. Its credibility will depend on whether members can generate investment, financial mechanisms, technology partnerships and development opportunities among themselves. India and Ethiopia are presented as a useful test case because their relationship connects the Indian Ocean with the Horn of Africa, New Delhi with a centre of African diplomacy, and one of Asia’s largest economies with one of Africa’s most consequential states.
The article says the opportunity is not to construct another vocabulary of solidarity but to demonstrate what solidarity can deliver. Fine words. The apparatus loves those.
Africa’s push for a bigger role in the global economy also played out in New York at Unstoppable Africa 2026, held alongside the 81st session of the United Nations General Assembly. The fifth edition of the Global Africa Business Initiative’s flagship convening drew senior leaders from business, government and global institutions to the Marriott Marquis in Times Square, including UN Secretary-General António Guterres, African Union Commission Chairperson Mahmoud Ali Youssouf and Massad Boulos, Senior Advisor to the President of the United States on Arab and African Affairs.
Guterres called for Africa to have a greater role on the global stage, including a permanent presence on the United Nations Security Council. He said Africa’s growing influence in global markets must translate into a stronger voice in international affairs and urged reforms to better reflect the needs of developing countries, particularly in Africa. He also said the continent’s natural resources, including critical minerals, should generate more local value and decent jobs rather than simply being exported.
Mahmoud Ali Youssouf said Africa’s 1.5 billion people and growing market create a significant opportunity, but the continent must accelerate the development of African value chains and remove barriers to trade to drive industrial transformation. He identified affordable energy, better infrastructure, access to finance, skills, technology and clear standards as critical requirements for Africa to turn its market potential into faster economic growth.
The private sector took center stage, with the Leaders Panel bringing together Samaila Zubairu, President and CEO of the Africa Finance Corporation; Aliko Dangote, Founder and Chairman of the Dangote Group; Mandy DeFilippo, CEO of Americas, Europe, Middle East and Africa at Standard Chartered; Nonkululeko Nyembezi, Chairperson of Standard Bank Group; Nolitha Fakude, Chairperson of Anglo American South Africa; and Tidjane Thiam, General Partner at Allied Critical Minerals Fund. Leaders stressed the need to move beyond exporting raw materials, including critical minerals and crude oil, by developing local processing, manufacturing and value chains that create jobs and retain more economic value on the continent.
One of the highlights announced was that the US$300 million Nigeria Distributed Renewable Energy Fund had reached its first close, securing its initial capital commitments and moving into operation. Co-managed by the Nigeria Sovereign Investment Authority and Africa50, the fund will provide equity financing to local clean-energy developers, supporting decentralized solutions including solar mini-grids, solar home systems, commercial and industrial power solutions and energy storage. Aligned with Mission 300, which aims to connect 300 million Africans to electricity by 2030, the fund is designed to mobilize private investment and expand reliable energy access for Nigerian homes and businesses.
Energy was another major focus. Anna Bjerde, Managing Director of Operations at the World Bank Group, and Damilola Ogunbiyi, CEO and Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for Sustainable Energy for All, joined discussions on how innovative finance could unlock investment in Africa’s power infrastructure and accelerate access to reliable energy.
Healthcare also featured within the wider economic conversation. Roche reaffirmed its commitment to advancing breast cancer care through its Africa Breast Cancer Ambition, which aims to help 80% of women diagnosed with breast cancer in Africa survive for at least five years by 2030.
Unstoppable Africa 2026 continued on September 21 with further sessions focused on digital transformation, investment, creative industries, sport and Africa’s role in the global economy. The summit circuit keeps expanding. The hierarchy does too.