Nearly 15 years have passed since the acronym BRICs (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa) was brought into popular vernacular by Goldman Sachs economist Jim O’Neill. Much anticipation was placed on this emerging bloc and its potential future impact on the global economy.

In the years since, these countries have undergone dramatic land-use transformations in the name of economic ‘growth’ and ‘development.’

These dramatic land transformations are also spaces of contestation: between the planned and unplanned, the rural and urban, of imaginations about futures and understandings of the present and past.

These spaces of contestation merit our attention. ODID and Green Templeton College are pleased to invite you to a workshop that aims to bring together early-career academics and doctoral students to engage in an interdisciplinary discussion reflecting on these large-scale transformations of land and space in the BRICS.

09:00 Registration

09:30 Welcome Remarks

09:45 Panel 1: Urban Spaces (Discussant: Dr. Idalina Baptista – University of Oxford)

11:15 Tea/Coffee Break

11:30 Panel 2: Infrastructure Spaces (Discussant: Professor Ruth Hall – PLAAS, University of Western Cape)

13:30 Lunch

14:30 Panel 3: Rural Spaces (Discussant: Dr. Geoff Goodwin – University of Oxford)

15:45 Closing Discussion

16:00 Tea/Coffee Break

16:30 Keynote Address by Professor Ruth Hall: ‘Rethinking agrarian transformations: Agribusiness expansionism in, by and via the BRICS’

18:00 Reception in the Main Hall

19:00 Dinner