In an interview with the Financial Times, the head of the multinational lender the New Development Bank, Dilma Rousseff said on Tuesday that the BRICS bank is presently considering applications for membership from almost 15 different nations.

Rousseff, a former president of Brazil who has taken the helm of the Shanghai-based bank, said the bank is expected to approve the applications for membership of four or five new members, however she did not specify which nations may be about to make the cut.

She did however say that one of the bank’s top priorities at present is the diversification of its geographic representation.

In the interview, she said, “We expect to lend between $8 billion and $10 billion this year. Our aim is to reach about 30% of everything we lend… in local currency.”

She went on to point out that the bank has plans to begin lending in the South African and Brazilian currencies in the near future to further reduce the bloc’s reliance on the US dollar, as part of a broader plan of the bank to promote a more multi-polar international financial ecosystem.

Rousseff said the lender will begin issuing debt in rand which will be lent in South Africa, and it will do “the same thing in Brazil with the real.”

She said, “We’re going to try to either do a currency swap or issue debt. And also in rupees,” noting that the lender already issues debt in renminbi.

The New Development Bank was launched in 2014 by the BRICS group, made up of Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa, to offer funding for infrastructure projects and sustainable development initiatives in developing nations.

The bank opened its doors in 2015, and later added the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, and Uruguay as members. The NDB was intended to serve as a financial counterbalance to the US-dominated financial institutions, such as the IMF and World Bank.