UFA, Russia - China will become the president country of BRICS cooperation mechanism starting from January 1, 2017, said Russia's Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov on Thursday.

"Starting from China, we will begin new presidency calendar, which will be for one full year term," Ryabkov told China Daily at a briefing of BRICS summit.

He said India will follow Russia as presidency country form March 2016.

China hosted a BRICS summit in April 2011 in Sanya, Hainan province.

Since the first leaders meeting in 2009, Ryabkov said BRICS association has already played a big role in international affairs and some countries have shown intention to join in. According to him, the leaders have decided to keep the scale so far and in the future, the expansion or enlargement will be depending on its "natural process" of growing.