After the BRICS, here come the Cubita! This new acronym was coined by the club Demeter, the specialized ecosystem in agricultural and food strategic issues, to designate the agricultural powers of tomorrow: Cubita, for the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Ukraine, Brazil, Indonesia, Turkey, and Australia.
This is one of the main highlights of Demeter 2026, the 33rd edition of this 400-page reference work involving fifty contributing authors, published in February in partnership between the Demeter club and the Institute of International and Strategic Relations (Iris).
These six countries currently represent “10% of the world’s population, 15% of the earth’s land surface and most importantly 30% of global agricultural exports.” They “appear to be pivotal states for the coming years,” “a geostrategic hexagon that needs to be monitored,” explains Sébastien Abis, a research associate at Iris and president of the Demeter Club, during a press conference presenting the publication.
What makes their importance lies less in their current status than in their potential trajectory: “they are susceptible to potential shifts in agriculture, geopolitics, and climate. Through their structuring elements, they will disproportionately influence the global agricultural and food balances of tomorrow, for better and/or for worse.”
In other words, “if these states falter, they will become multipliers of crises and instability” while “if they develop, they will be engines of global food security and climate transitions.”
A Geopolitical Battle Looms over Ukraine
The first example: Ukraine, “one of the planet’s most strategic territories, particularly when it comes to agricultural, energy, and obviously geopolitical issues,” commented Arthur Portier, an analyst at Argus Media.
He emphasizes the strong resilience of the Ukrainian agricultural sector despite the war. In terms of production, “the Ukrainians have maintained their position as a major agricultural power on the world stage.”
In terms of logistics, they have achieved “a feat” as “despite blocked ports and severed roads, Ukraine has reinvented itself to maintain its vital role as a global food security hub” and the Danube has become a true commercial highway for cereals.
However, the challenges remain immense (regular energy cuts, labor shortages, fragile infrastructure), and a geopolitical battle is looming around the country. “The United States wants to make it a strategic ally in their showdown with China” while Beijing sees it as “its future agricultural garden.”
Meanwhile, “Europe hesitates,” warned Arthur Portier, stating that “integrating Ukraine into the EU could be a shock to agriculture if not done intelligently, but not integrating it risks seeing it drift towards other spheres of influence.”
To read more: – What are the agricultural implications of Ukraine’s entry into the EU? – Ukraine’s entry into the EU: regarding agriculture, “1 + 1 do not equal 2”.
Will Brazil shape global standards?
Caroline Rayol, a senior intelligence strategic analyst at the ADIT Economic Intelligence Group, discussed the example of Brazil, whose future power, according to her, will not only depend on what it produces but also on its ability to significantly influence the rules of the game, including sustainability, traceability, certification, market access, and green finance standards.
To become a “shaper of rules,” she believes that the country must implement a “long-term influence strategy” internally based on alignment between public and private actors around a clear trajectory.
Externally, the idea would be to “build alliances that go beyond competitive reflexes, including with European and American industries. These actors remain rivals in certain markets but can share convergent interests, particularly on the role of agriculture in climate and energy transition.”
“Either Brazil succeeds in this coalition and becomes a structuring pivot of global agroclimatic governance, or it remains powerful but contested, facing non-tariff barriers,” she predicts.
To delve further: How Mercosur boosts its cereal exports and competes with France.
Only 10% of the arable land in the DRC is currently utilized
Regarding the DRC, it is “a somewhat surprising choice,” admits Sébastien Abis. It is one of the world’s poorest countries, plagued by persistent territorial conflicts, but several of its characteristics make it an essential pivot.
As the second-largest African country, its population has tripled in thirty years and is expected to double again by 2050, making it one of the “great demographic giants of the planet.” It has abundant water resources in a region where they are scarce, the world’s second-largest tropical forest after the Amazon, and vast reserves of strategic minerals, including cobalt and copper.
Above all, its agricultural potential is noteworthy: the DRC has 80 million hectares of arable land, of which only 10% are currently utilized.
“We have a considerable margin for development and progress,” emphasizes Sébastien Abis. For him, “industrialization through agriculture and forest products” would allow the country to base its growth on resources other than minerals, while raising governance issues and relations with neighboring countries.
Beyond Cubita, the expert mentioned the EU’s positioning in “this world that is geopolitically and climatically tense”: it must “rethink its strategic planning and question the place it gives to the agricultural sector, which is at the heart of a sustainable competitiveness issue.”
The budgetary context complicates the equation: “the Common Agricultural Policy will have to coexist with the military and security expenditures that Europe is redeploying” even as the continent faces increasingly frequent climate setbacks that test the productive performance of its farmers.
*BRICS: emerging countries’ bloc consisting of Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa, joined in early 2024 by Iran, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, and Ethiopia, and in 2025 by Indonesia. Their goal is to counterbalance the economic powers of the G7. Read also: Towards a BRICS cereals exchange?
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