Gdp, Bric | featured news

The economies of Brazil, Russia, India and China account for 20 percent of the world economic output, and rising. That’s up four fold in the last decade, according to a report released yesterday by the International Monetary Fund. Despite the growth, problems in the core economies had made the post-2008 world a difficult one for the big four emerging markets.

Proponents of so-called "green accounting" - gathered in Rio de Janeiro this week for the Rio Earth Summit - hope that putting dollar values on resources will slam the brakes on unfettered development. A mentality of growth at any cost is already blamed for disasters like the chronic floods that hit deforested Haiti or the raging sand storms that have swept regions of China, worsening desertification.