The founder of World Chamber for social business, and Jikoni Foundation, Pune-based Ronita Roy has been instrumental for food security in India & abroad where along with her team, she steered the mission of serving nutritious food for free to underprivileged impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic to the tune of 500+ hot, nutritious free meals on her own to patients’ relatives undergoing treatment in Sassoon Hospital Pune and served 600,000 plus meals for which she was felicitated as the Pride of Pune Covid warrior. The social entrepreneur was earlier based in Nairobi, Kenya and worked extensive towards peace & conflict to promote peace through social entrepreneurship in collaboration with National Kenya Police. Ronita Roy writes in this opinion piece on the significance of the G20 where South Africa 2025 places Solidarity, Equality, and Sustainable Development at the centre of its presidency. Ronita represents a strong emerging voice from the Global South, advocating for economies that reward production over extraction, and value chains that serve people rather than exploit them. Her work places Africa and Asia at the centre of global thought leadership on sustainable trade and inclusive value systems.
Rebalancing the Scales: Trade Resilience & Inclusive Value Chains for a Fairer Global Economy
An Opinion by Ronita Roy Ghosh,
President, World Chamber for Social Business (WCSB):
In a world marked by profound geopolitical shifts, fragile supply chains, and widening economic inequities, the need to rethink global trade has never been more urgent. As G20 South Africa 2025 places Solidarity, Equality, and Sustainable Development at the centre of its presidency, focusing on Trade, Resilience & Inclusive Value Chains, has been tasked with crafting solutions that move people from the margins to the centre of global economic activity. This reflection highlights key insights emerging from our recent deliberations that brought together voices from across Africa and the Global South to co-shape a more equitable trading future.
- The Global Trade System is Under Strain, And the Global South Feels It First
The rules-based international trade system is buckling under unprecedented pressure. Geopolitical fragmentation, rising protectionism, and selective enforcement of trade rules are undermining predictability, disproportionately hurting developing economies. Countries in the Global South remain particularly vulnerable to:
• Tariff shocks
• Commodity boom–bust cycles
• Climate-induced disruptions
This reality magnifies systemic challenges that have historically constrained industrialisation and diversification in emerging economies.
We must restore trust in trade architecture while redesigning it to work for everyone, not just those at the top. 3 “Global rules lose their legitimacy when the very architects of those rules selectively choose when to obey them.” — Ronita Roy Ghosh
2. Inclusive Value Chains: People First, Not Just Products
Across Africa and the Global South, informal and cross-border traders, predominantly women and youth, form the backbone of economic activity. Yet they remain largely excluded from formal value chains. To build inclusive, dignified value chains, we must:
•Expand access to finance
• Enable market information and digital tools
• Provide secure trade licensing routes
• Build transition pathways into formal systems, not force them
• Foster regional & global integration
“Support should never demand erasure. Sometimes real inclusion simply means meeting people where they stand.” — Ronita Roy Ghosh
This approach strengthens dignity, encourages social protection, and ensures that small actors become growth engines, not collateral.
3. Industrialisation & Regional Integration Are the Heart of Resilience
Industrial development, not resource extraction, is the engine of durable prosperity. Yet Africa’s manufacturing potential is constrained by:
• Fragmented domestic production
• Limited regional linkages
• Dependence on imported components
We must:
•Strengthen regional value chains
• Link SMMEs to catalytic industries
• Build market-aligned technical skills
• Develop local manufacturing of intermediate goods
For example, South Africa’s automotive sector, despite its global competitiveness, still imports most components, effectively exporting jobs.
“Africa must not only supply the world; Africa must help build it.” — Ronita Roy Ghosh
4. Financial Sovereignty Beyond the De-Dollarisation Debate
Rather than engaging in the politically loaded term “dedollarisation,” the discussion must be anchored in Financial Sovereignty. Africa is already innovating through:
• Pan-African Payment & Settlement System (PAPSS)
• COMESA Digital Retail Payment Platform
• G20-backed promotion of local currency capital markets
Trading in local currencies strengthens stability and keeps value where it is created.
“When nations trade in their own currencies, they trade with dignity.” — Ronita Roy Ghosh
5. Reframing North–South Economic Relations
We cannot ignore history. The Global North built its prosperity through extractive systems and favourable trade regimes. Today, developing nations face:
•Market flooding & dumping
• Anti-competitive tariff structures
• Shrinking policy space to industrialise
Dumping practices push local producers out of markets, worsening unemployment and de-industrialisation. To correct structural imbalance, the G20 must:
• Strengthen anti-dumping disciplines
• Support industrial policy in developing economies
• Create fairer market access
“Economic justice requires more than access—it requires equal power.” — Ronita Roy Ghosh
6. Critical Minerals & the Just Energy Transition
The green transition has intensified demand for critical minerals largely found in the Global South. But extraction without local value addition repeats colonial patterns. We must:
•Process minerals domestically
• Retain value at source
• Integrate minerals into regional industrial plans
Without this, the future will simply replicate the past.
“Critical minerals must not become another chapter of critical extraction. ”– Ronita Roy Ghosh
7. Civil Society Must Shape the Future
Unlike governments and commercial lobbies, civil society brings voices of:
• Workers
• Women
• Youth
• Farmers
• Informal traders
These are the true engines of resilience. We must harmonise with other G20 engagement tracks, but we must not dilute our responsibility to speak truth from the ground up.
“Economies are strongest when every citizen becomes a stakeholder—not a spectator.” — Ronita Roy Ghosh
A Way Forward
Thematic Group II will consolidate three strategic recommendations for the G20 Social Summit, rooted in the following priority pillars:
• Rebalance Global Value Chains
• Empower Informal & Community-Based Traders
• Advance Financial Sovereignty & Local Currency Systems
• Promote Industrialisation & Regional Integration
• Reinvigorate Multilateralism for Fairness
At stake is not just how trade flows, but how dignity flows.
Who benefits? Who participates? Who is left behind?
“Global value chains must carry not just goods—but justice.” — Ronita Roy Ghosh
Why This Matters
A prosperous future must be both locally rooted and globally connected, ensuring that the communities that produce value also share in it. As South Africa leads the G20 in 2025, we stand at an inflexion point, where Africa and the Global South can shape a new narrative: One where:
• Development is an opportunity
• Trade is equitable
• Production is dignified
• People are centred
Because a fairer world is not only possible, It is inevitable if we choose it.
Ronita Roy Ghosh can be reached on: connect@chamberforsocialbusiness.com and on the website: http://chamberforsocialbusiness.com/
