Key Takeaways
• BRICS expands to include six new members, now covering nearly 40% of the world’s population as of 2025.
• BRICS aims to streamline visa processes and promote easier travel, countering stricter US immigration and rising global trade tensions.
• BRICS opposes unilateral US tariffs, advances de-dollarization, and plans shared tourism and mobility frameworks to boost cooperation.
The BRICS nations — made up of Brazil 🇧🇷, Russia 🇷🇺, India 🇮🇳, China 🇨🇳, South Africa 🇿🇦, and, with their recent expansion, joined by Egypt 🇪🇬, Iran 🇮🇷, Saudi Arabia 🇸🇦, United Arab Emirates 🇦🇪, Ethiopia 🇪🇹, and Indonesia 🇮🇩 — are pushing for increased travel cooperation in response to recent changes in US immigration policies and growing trade tensions. These countries now represent about 40% of the world’s population, according to recent discussions reported in many international meetings and detailed by VisaVerge.com.
Why BRICS Members Want Travel Cooperation
In the past few years, US immigration rules have become more difficult for many visitors, students, and professionals. The tightening of these rules is especially tough on people from BRICS nations. Many applicants have faced longer waiting times, stricter checks, and rising rejection rates. These challenges have caused worries about whether students and professionals from these countries can easily continue to visit, study, or work in the United States 🇺🇸.
As a direct answer to these new hurdles, the BRICS nations are promoting inclusive travel initiatives. This means they want to make it easier and faster for people to visit, study, or work within their own group. If someone finds it hard to secure a US visa due to stricter US immigration rules, BRICS hopes to offer a reliable alternative. By doing so, member states can help each other and keep good exchanges between their people and businesses.
Making the BRICS Visa Process Easier
To help promote more movement across borders, BRICS countries are working together to make their visa systems simpler. There is a new push within the group to make visa processes as smooth as possible, cutting down on wait times and paperwork. They want to welcome more travelers, students, business visitors, and digital nomads. This approach is seen as a way to support economic growth, boost cultural ties, and ensure that BRICS countries become attractive places for both tourism and business.
For instance, BRICS officials are talking about creating common ground for mobility frameworks—rules that help people move from one BRICS country to another with less hassle. Streamlined procedures may include group electronic visas, policies for easy long-term stays for professionals, and special programs for students. Some experts say these changes could eventually make visiting BRICS countries almost as simple as traveling within the Schengen Zone in Europe.
Tourism: Working Together in a Changing World
One of the biggest steps taken this year was the first technical meeting of the BRICS Tourism Working Group in March 2025. During this meeting, officials from all BRICS members sat down in Brasília to plan how they could support each other’s tourism industries better. Their main goals:
- Make travel between BRICS countries easier, less expensive, and more comfortable.
- Attract digital nomads (people who work online and move from country to country).
- Promote sustainable tourism that protects the environment and local cultures.
- Share ideas on new technology, like digital visa systems and travel safety apps.
Travel experts say these changes can make it much easier for people from BRICS countries to visit each other — and to do so in ways that are good for the local economy and the planet. With tensions rising between the US 🇺🇸 and China 🇨🇳, and with US immigration rules becoming less welcoming, this deeper travel cooperation is seen as a useful counter-balance.
The next main step is a BRICS tourism ministers’ meeting scheduled for May 12 in Brasília. There, ministers hope to agree on an official declaration—a statement that spells out shared ideas and plans for travel growth. This would set clear goals and show the world that BRICS nations can work together, especially when others are putting up barriers.
Standing Together Against Trade Protectionism
Travel is just one area where the group is showing unity. In April 2025, foreign ministers from all BRICS nations met in Rio de Janeiro. During this important meeting, they spoke out strongly against the “resurgence of trade protectionism.” These words were meant to criticize the US 🇺🇸 government’s habit of using high tariffs on imports, a move closely linked to policies from President Trump.
Although BRICS ministers did not mention the US by name, their statements clearly responded to recent US tariffs—especially a 145% levy on certain Chinese goods. Tariffs are taxes on goods brought into a country from abroad. High tariffs often make it much more expensive for people and companies to buy these goods. This can create problems for BRICS countries, which sell many products and services around the world.
The foreign ministers’ discussions show that BRICS stands together as a group in supporting international rules for trade. They say the world economy should not be run by a few powerful countries handing out penalties as they please. Instead, they back multilateral trade systems, or systems where rules are agreed on by many nations at once.
For people running businesses in BRICS nations, this approach means having reliable partners and fewer surprises when it comes to selling or buying goods. For governments, the unity also sends a message: if one country faces tough measures, the whole group may respond together.
Changing the Balance of Power
One major move by the BRICS nations in 2025 is expanding their membership. Adding Egypt 🇪🇬, Iran 🇮🇷, Saudi Arabia 🇸🇦, UAE 🇦🇪, Ethiopia 🇪🇹, and Indonesia 🇮🇩 has made the group almost double the population it represents. Some experts say this gives the bloc more bargaining power both in global politics and economics.
With more countries in, BRICS can share skills, information, and resources more widely. This allows group members to create new financial tools so they rely less on systems run mainly by Western countries.
A big part of this shift is working to use alternatives to the US dollar in their business with each other. This is called “de-dollarization”—when countries use their own money or new shared currencies for trade, instead of always using US dollars. Doing this could offer more control and less risk if US policy changes suddenly.
However, these efforts have met with strong criticism from some in the United States 🇺🇸. President Trump has warned that he will put even tougher tariffs on any BRICS country adopting de-dollarization measures. Still, many BRICS nations see this as necessary to protect their own economies and make global finance fairer.
Why Are These Moves Important Now?
The push for stronger travel cooperation and a stand against tough US immigration policies comes at a crucial moment. The global economy is slowly recovering from the disruptions of the past few years, and new tensions between China 🇨🇳 and the US 🇺🇸 have made international trade less certain. Many experts agree that when one powerful country makes it hard for people and goods to cross borders, others often react by forming new groups and making alternative deals.
The challenges highlighted by stricter US immigration rules—such as longer waits for visas and rising reports of rejected applications—mean that students, workers, and tourists from BRICS nations must look elsewhere for opportunities. Travel cooperation inside the BRICS bloc gives them fresh paths to access education, jobs, and new places to visit.
At the same time, the US focus on new and higher tariffs has made global trade less predictable, not only for BRICS but also for other regions. This is why BRICS is committed to defending what it sees as fair and open systems for trade and travel.
What Could Change for Travelers and Businesses?
For travelers, the plans for better travel cooperation could transform how people move between BRICS nations. If new visa rules are simpler and faster, and if there are more direct air links between member countries, students will find it easier to apply for schools, workers will get jobs with less paperwork, and tourists will visit more places within the group.
- Business travelers could benefit from special long-term work visas.
- Students may see more chances for exchange programs without the usual delays.
- Families looking to visit relatives can expect less red tape.
For businesses, these moves could mean more stable markets and less risk of sudden new restrictions. Companies will have clearer rules about moving goods and staff across borders, and investors may feel more comfortable putting money into new projects.
Looking Ahead: What’s Next for BRICS and the United States?
The big question is how this BRICS approach will affect global travel and trade. As more countries join the group and the world sees stricter US immigration controls continue, we may see even stronger links inside the BRICS bloc. This could mean more shared visa policies, closer coordination on health and safety standards for travelers, and joint tourism promotions.
However, experts point out that agreeing on every detail will be tough, given the wide range of cultures, economies, and rules in the BRICS group. Each country has its own history, its own way of handling visitors, and different security needs. Finding the right balance will take time and effort. But with the world’s economic power shifting and travel needs growing, the weight of the BRICS nations is hard to ignore.
Opinions and Controversies
Of course, not everyone agrees with the moves made by BRICS. Some Western business leaders worry that increased BRICS cooperation on travel and trade may hurt their own economies or make it harder for them to sell products in Asia, Africa, or South America. Others fear that new blocks in global trade could create more division instead of more cooperation.
On the other hand, many people in BRICS nations see these changes as a fair response to a world where some powerful countries have often set the rules alone. They believe working together will make it possible to overcome problems caused by outside restrictions, and open up new opportunities for young people, families, and entrepreneurs.
US Immigration: Ongoing Challenges
For anyone following US immigration news, the changes in policy have been hard to ignore. The latest crackdowns have led to a real sense of uncertainty. According to analysis from VisaVerge.com, more students and professionals from BRICS nations now worry about getting US visas. Wait times have become longer, and sudden shifts in policy create confusion.
Some US businesses have said that these stricter policies could hurt the country’s own long-term interests, as they discourage talented students and skilled professionals who want to come, learn, work, and contribute.
You can find up-to-date details about official visa and immigration requirements and forms at the U.S. Department of State’s travel page. This source is helpful if you need to check the latest visa application steps.
Final Thoughts: A New Path in Global Movement
As the world’s biggest group of fast-growing economies, the BRICS nations are using their shared influence to give their people more choices, especially in the face of stricter US immigration laws and growing trade battles. Whether through making travel easier among their countries, speaking out against unfair trade, or building new financial tools, the group’s direction is clear.
Travel cooperation among BRICS countries is not just about simple visits or jobs—it’s about giving millions of people more options in uncertain times. The success or challenges of these plans will be watched closely in the coming months as the world’s travel and trade landscape keeps changing. For people around the globe, it means more choices and perhaps a new era in how countries work together.
Learn Today
De-dollarization → The process where countries use currencies other than the US dollar for international trade to reduce dependency on Western financial systems.
Trade Protectionism → Economic policy of imposing high tariffs or restrictions to protect domestic industries from foreign competition, often causing global trade tensions.
Schengen Zone → A group of European countries that allow unrestricted travel across borders for residents and visitors, serving as a simplified travel model.
Digital Nomads → Individuals who work remotely using technology and move between countries, taking advantage of flexible visa and residency options.
Multilateral Trade Systems → International economic agreements where trade rules are made collectively by many countries instead of being set by one or a few powers.
This Article in a Nutshell
BRICS nations, now expanded and representing 40% of the world’s population, are uniting to streamline travel and trade. Facing stricter US immigration rules and higher tariffs, BRICS is enhancing internal mobility, simplifying visas, and promoting cooperation—challenging traditional Western dominance in global movement while protecting their economic interests.
— By VisaVerge.com
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