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The Congress of South African Trade Unions welcomes the convening of the Green Economy Summit by government, on 18-20 May 2010. It comes at a time when the country is facing serious challenges to ensure energy security to industry and affordable energy to the workers and the poor.

COSATU expects the summit to develop a clear programme to provide clean and sustainable sources of energy, which is made even more urgent by the steep electricity tariff increases.

The outcomes of the recent Copenhagen Climate Change Conference also require developing countries to submit proposals for Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions (NAMAs), showing their plans to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. Accordingly, this summit must be a platform for the country to discuss the types of projects that will reduce South Africa's greenhouse gas emissions.

The effect of climate change is also impacting negatively on the country's water security. Even in the absence of the effects of climate change, South Africa is a water-scarce country. This is another reason COSATU wants the summit to succeed and hopes that it will present an opportunity for putting high on the agenda a developmental path that takes into account the imperative of preserving our planet for future generations.

We hope the summit will begin a process to ensure stronger coordination among all departments involved, including Trade and Industry, Water and Environmental Affairs, Energy, Economic Development, Science and Technology, Transport and Cooperative Governance and Traditional affairs, in developing and implementing a sustainable growth strategy to help to mitigate the effects of climate change while creating decent work.

This coordination must be linked to:
• the Industrial Action Plan (IPAP2) and the new growth path strategy,

• the introduction of clean, renewable and affordable energy sources,

• provision of effective, efficient and affordable public transport system, and

• provision of clean water to the majority of our people

As part of efforts to move towards clean and renewable sources of energy, we have welcomed the announcement of the launch of the first wind energy farm in the Eastern Cape. According to reports it will have 25 wind turbines, each of which is expected to supply 1700 households. 25 turbines would thus supply 42 500 households with clean energy - 2.5% of the province's 1.738m households.

Whilst this may not be quite significant, in the light of the fact that the Eastern Cape and Limpopo are the two provinces with the highest rates of wood and paraffin usage, 40.8% and 54.4% respectively, this should be welcome. We need to see more interventions of this kind and the summit must develop strategies to support such initiatives.

As the country builds the infrastructure to make all the above possible, efforts must be made to avoid as far as possible importing goods which could be manufactured locally.

IPAP2 does not include intermediate goods that support ‘green economy' in its proposed list of large and strategic goods that must be supported through procurement regulations. So the country would be missing an opportunity, as renewable sources of energy would create many opportunities for local manufacturers and for creating jobs. This means that while initially the goods could be imported, there must be a commitment from foreign suppliers to help ramp up domestic capacity over time.

We hope this will give other investors confidence to invest more in renewable energy and help create more decent work. There is a concern that the country is short of critical skills needed for developing renewable sources of energy, particularly plumbers. There is therefore a need to ensure that JIPSA attends to this issue, including recognising the skills of current workers who are doing plumbing work but do not have qualifications.

An affordable public transport system will also go a long way in reducing carbon emissions and the impact of climate change. The improvement of our public transport system will ensure successful implementation of IPAP2, if the local manufactures are given an opportunity to produce the goods. This will improve the lives of the majority of workers while creating more job opportunities.

In the context of more debates on clean energy, we would like to hear more arguments on the need to invest more in nuclear energy. Nuclear energy is capital intensive, costly and dangerous and the country must be careful as it discusses the energy mix options.

The summit must also discuss an effective communication strategy that will ensure that the majority of electricity consumers change their behaviour and use electricity efficiently as part of efforts to minimise the impact of climate change.