FACT SHEET: NEGOTIATING A SOUTH AFRICAN RENEWABLE ENERGY MASTERPLAN (SAREM)

This fact sheet by the Institute for Economic Justice (IEJ) audits the August 2022 draft of the South African Renewable Energy Masterplan (SAREM). It evaluates the draft against labour recommendations, arguing that the current plan lacks sufficient detail on decent work, public ownership, and aggressive localisation. The IEJ proposes a series of demands for final negotiations to ensure the energy transition supports employment creation, local manufacturing, and a proactive recycling industry.

• The SAREM draft fails to define 'decent work' or establish a framework to monitor the creation of decent jobs, relying on job figures from the 2019 Integrated Resource Plan. Labour representatives express concern that many current opportunities in the Renewable Energy Independent Power Producer Procurement Programme (REI4P) are 'temporary and casualised'.
• The IEJ argues that SAREM underestimates the role of public ownership and public finance. It suggests that Eskom should own and operate pilot projects and that the government should provide low-cost debt to local manufacturers to offset the 'premium' cost of locally produced goods, citing China's use of cheap debt to dominate the global PV module market.
• The current SAREM draft is criticized for lacking analysis on trade dynamics and relying too heavily on the hope of export potential in Africa. The IEJ recommends applying import tariffs to strategic components to protect nascent local industry and drive down local product costs.
• The IEJ contends that the SAREM draft's approach to Local Content Requirements (LCRs) is insufficient and that the proposed point-based system (70% price, 20% local content, 10% transformation) encourages a 'race to the bottom'. It calls for a 50% LCR for the next wave of public procurement RFPs, starting with Bid Window 6.
• While a Technology Transfer System (TTS) was included in the draft following labour inputs, the IEJ notes it is not listed as a high-priority task and lacks a clear definition. A coherent TTS is deemed necessary to prevent Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs) from protecting intellectual property at the expense of local capacity.
• Recycling is entirely absent from the SAREM draft. The IEJ argues that the recycling of solar PV modules and wind turbines is costly and requires public subsidies to be viable, making it a suitable candidate for public ownership, potentially through municipal recycling depots.

APA

Institute for Economic Justice (2022). FACT SHEET: NEGOTIATING A SOUTH AFRICAN RENEWABLE ENERGY MASTERPLAN (SAREM). https://iej.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/IEJ-SAREM-fact-sheet.pdf

Chicago

Institute for Economic Justice. FACT SHEET: NEGOTIATING A SOUTH AFRICAN RENEWABLE ENERGY MASTERPLAN (SAREM). 2022. https://iej.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/IEJ-SAREM-fact-sheet.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |author=Institute for Economic Justice |title=FACT SHEET: NEGOTIATING A SOUTH AFRICAN RENEWABLE ENERGY MASTERPLAN (SAREM) |date=October 2022 |url=https://iej.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/IEJ-SAREM-fact-sheet.pdf |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{instituteforeconomicjustice2022fact, author = {{Institute for Economic Justice}}, title = {{FACT SHEET: NEGOTIATING A SOUTH AFRICAN RENEWABLE ENERGY MASTERPLAN (SAREM)}}, institution = {Institute for Economic Justice}, year = {2022}, month = oct, url = {https://iej.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2022/10/IEJ-SAREM-fact-sheet.pdf}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }