in houston, texas, diane sutherland, you are recognized. >> this subcommittee, to testify at the hearing, asset energy future. and in both the continent, fossil fuel and alternative energy sectors and in parallel significant growth in international investment. there's an abundance of fossil fuels, the continent is solely underpower and access to clean affordable energy is a luxury to the population. despite the continent possessing 6% of global oil reserves and responsible for 10% of global production the majority do not have the resources. many of these countries earn incredible sums of revenue from hydrocarbons, agricultural and mining sectors invested in infrastructure. the company's opening up oil and gas potential are predominantly small to midsize independent firms with limited capital, security expiration conducted geophysical work and market to larger multinational firms to secure funding and minimize risk when it comes to drilling. to resolve those major discoveries over the past two decades and the opening -- in the past ten years significant oil and gas discoveries have been d

i would like to welcome from houston, texas, diane sutherland, and you're recognized. please proceed. >> i would like to convey my appreciation to the subcommittee for the invitation to testify at this hearing today on africa's energy future. since entering the african energy industry over 14 years ago, i have witnessed a vast transformation in both the continent's fossil fuel and alternative energy sector sectors and in parallel, significant growth in international investment. although africa holds an abundance of fossil fuels and renewable energy resources, the continent is sorely underpowered in access to clean, affordable energy is a luxury to most of its over $1 billion population and despite the continent possessing 6% of global oil reserves and being responsible for about 10% of global production, the majority of africans do not reap the benefits of the resources. many of these underpowered countries earn incredible sums of revenue from their hydrocarbon, agricultural, and mining sectors, but very little is, in turn, invested into power infrastructure. the compa

diane sutherland has been working in africa for the past 17 years. 13 of those years as president of egypt. ms. sutherland and to the oil and gas publishing business in 2001 and by 2002 was known as petroleum africa at magazine. he launched alternative energy africa magazine. officer services, as consultants to resource development, financial consultants of gone out -- of course. we will hook up with her by way of video. >> thank you, ranking member smith, chairman chris smith one, mr stockman. i appreciate the opportunity to come here this afternoon to talk about energy, something that is of critical importance not only to africa, it is important to the u.s. economy and i have some prepared remarks i am going to refer to and submitted testimony. i am going to take a different take than the first panel because i am coming from the civil society side of the ledger and unwanted to take a few moments to talk about leadership africa. we do programs throughout africa. before that i was instrumental in working on the caribbean basin initiative and we worked on it. i want to say to you any