Chairperson, hon Minister, hon Deputy Minister, hon members, distinguished guests, and ladies and gentlemen, I wish to thank the hon Minister for his developmental budget speech, which was well delivered, and also the Deputy Ministers for their speeches supporting his speech.
Allow me, hon Chair, to start by saying that the ANC supports Budget Vote No 36 of the Department of Trade and Industry for 2013-14. Let me also take this opportunity to congratulate the Department of Trade and Industry for a job well done on one of the department's major programmes, which is the Manufacturing Competitiveness Enhancement Programme. This programme was launched in May 2012. To date a total of 189 enterprises have been approved for grants to a value of R992,2 million, and 33 551 jobs are expected to be retained. We also congratulate the department for other successes mentioned in the budget speech here today. This is very remarkable.
Hon Chair, with your permission, let me focus in the beginning of my speech on clean energy in our country, South Africa, from a manufacturing perspective. The Industrial Policy Action Plan outlines the fact that, for the purpose of the development of the economy, there is a need for investment in the manufacturing sector to ensure an increase in employment creation. These are value-adding industries, which create the highest opportunities for employment.
The South African government has continuously outlined the need for the country to redirect some of its efforts towards the green economy for purposes of job creation and economic growth. In the process of finding innovative ways to transform the country's manufacturing sector, the green economy offers opportunities to work on strategies aimed at ensuring sustainability and resource efficiency to improve the productivity of the manufacturing sector. The benefit of this will be the creation of jobs and opportunities to diversify export offerings as the demand for green goods increases in developed countries.
In the words of the US President, Barack Obama:
... a green, renewable energy economy isn't some pie-in-the-sky, far-off future, it is now. It is creating jobs, now. It is providing cheap alternatives ... now. And it can create millions of additional jobs and entire new industries if we act now.
[Applause.]
Industrial Policy Action Plan 2, Ipap 2, calls for the following in order to effectively address the required structural changes from a manufacturing perspective. Firstly, electricity and capital-intensive resource-processing sectors should introduce new cutting-edge alternative technologies and processes to make additional investments in green technologies and sectors. Secondly, the share of value-adding, labour-intensive sectors should be increased and the share of energy-intensive sectors in the GDP should be decreased. Thirdly, accelerated growth that will be sustained in the green and energy-efficient sectors should be promoted.
The success of projects identified by the Industrial Policy Action Plan relies on how well the various departments work together. The Department of Trade and Industry, working together with other departments, specifically the Department of Energy, has embarked on the following programmes to ensure the transformation of the manufacturing sector through green technologies. [Interjections.]
Firstly, the DTI is in the process of developing a comprehensive solar and wind sector development strategy. Approved in May 2012 in principle and still to be finalised, the strategy has identified seven key action programmes, namely, market facilitation, local manufacturing and industry upgrading incentives, local content requirements, technical and physical infrastructure, trade and investment support and facilitation, research demonstration, and skills development. Secondly, the DTI supports the development of energy-efficient products and services in a competitive local manufacturing industry.
Thirdly, as part of the Manufacturing Competitiveness Enhancement Programme, the DTI provides the Green Technology and Resource Efficiency Improvement Incentive. This is an incentive programme to support projects with green technology upgrades and business development activities that will lead to cleaner production and resource efficiency.
Fourthly, the Department of Trade and Industry is also funding an industrial sustainability programme that is managed by the National Cleaner Production Centre of South Africa. The objective of the programme is to strengthen market access to South Africa's industry by developing networks and transferring resource efficiency and cleaner production technologies and services.
Therefore, the department is contributing to the sustainability of industry value chains, and delivering measurable economic, environmental and social impacts. Thank you very much, Chairperson. [Applause.]