Madam Speaker, hon members, hon Ministers, Deputy Ministers present, the House at large and our guests of Parliament, first of all, before I begin my speech, I would like to make a short comment on the amendment that was seen on today's Order Paper. It was just a matter that we felt, as a committee, that it was ambiguous for an Act to prescribe how the department should appoint its CEO. So, we felt that the following clause, which was general, was sufficient to address that. So, that is why we decided, all of us, to agree that we must put away the succession from the SA National Research Institute, Saneri, to the SA National Research Development Institute, Sanedi. Otherwise, thank you very much for accepting our amendment.
Please allow me to start my speech by first declaring that the ANC supports the National Energy Bill. Today, as I stand before this honourable House, it is 14 years after the advent of our democracy in 1994, but it is also 10 years after the launch of our country's White Paper on Energy Policy in 1998. No doubt that this important White Paper on Energy Policy of our country, which acted as a central document in mapping out our energy needs in the last 10 years, requires a review and a renewal since some assumptions underpinning it are no longer valid at present and beyond. Hence the development of the current National Energy Bill, the Bill to take the country to the distant future in so far as the security of energy supply and its needs are concerned.
In a nutshell, this Bill seeks to address all energy security issues in such a manner as to become the energy security framework to all aspects related to energy utilisation and optimisation. It further seeks to achieve this objective by smoothly interfacing with all other related pieces of legislation that our Parliament has so far instituted on behalf of our nation. It must be emphasised at this juncture that the current Bill does not seek to replace any of the existing institutions, but to strengthen them.
The approach adopted in the development of this Bill has been, amongst other things, to establish an environment conducive to energy research on a wider scale; strengthening of energy efficiency options in our everyday life activities; as well as to collect as much data as the Department of Minerals and Energy as we possibly can, in order to correctly model different energy scenarios in various regions of our country, and at various times of our economic development from the present into the future. This environment has been achieved by developing an energy entity which is going to be known as the South African National Energy Development Institute, Sanedi.
Under Sanedi we, as the ANC, foresee a rigorous engagement with and modelling of all our energy systems and planning of an efficient and integrated energy system that will guide our country, the region and the continent into becoming an important role-player in a global context both economically and technologically. Why are we advocating this and why have we chosen this path and option?
Expenditure on energy account for approximately 7% to 8% of the GDP worldwide. In addition, annual global investments in energy supply technologies run into billions of dollars, whilst trillions of dollars are spent on products that consume energy. Furthermore, the global energy system is expected to expand substantially during the next decades, with the bulk of these increases coming from the developing world, that our country forms part of.
In future, it is the desire of our ANC-led government to follow an aggressive and radical policy on renewable energy technology. I was recently in China, where I learnt that China is vigorously pursuing a green technology revolution in renewable energy to the point where it is beginning to compete with Germany, which has always been known to be a leader in renewable energy technology. The recent report from the climate group says that despite China's coal-dependent economy, it has become a world leader now in the manufacture of solar photovoltaic technology. Its biggest solar companies have a combined value of over $15 billion and around 820 megawatts of solar photovoltaic were produced in China in the year 2007. China already leads the world in terms of installed renewable capacity at 152 gigawatts. Next year China will become the world leader in exports of wind turbines, and it has become highly competitive in solar water heaters, energy efficient home appliances and rechargeable batteries.
Surprised by this economic usage of energy and in particular electricity in Beijing during my recent visit, I was further impressed when I was made to understand that China's energy programme is so radical that each month they are engaged in a built programme equivalent to that proposed currently by Eskom over a period of five years. If properly managed and developed, Sanedi, as proposed in this National Energy Bill, can make significant strides as a potential competitor with China's green revolution. We therefore feel that if Sanedi incorporates also the renewable energy and adopts what we call "distributed energy resources" in order to improve its efficiency energy activities, we will be able to model energy today and beyond. Thank you. [Applause.]