Chinese Minister of Construction Wang Guangtao said the country urgently needs to build houses that save energy, land, water and construction materials, Tuesday's People's Daily reported.

In an exclusive interview with the newspaper, a Communist Party of China organ, Wang said it was of strategic significance for China to construct energy-efficient and land-saving buildings to help improve the country's economic structure and change its growth pattern, which is currently based on high energy consumption and low output.

"It's also important for China to construct such buildings considering its energy and grain security in the future," Wang said.

According to the minister, China's buildings cover a total area of 40 billion square meters, and 95 percent of them are "highly energy-consuming."

The country plans to build an additional 30 billion square meters of buildings by the year 2020, he added.

Wang said the energy consumed by the building industry accounted for 30 percent of the country's total; construction materials, 16.7 percent; water, 47 percent; iron and steel, 30 percent; and cement, 25 percent.

The average per capita coal owned by the Chinese is just half the world average, and that of oil, one-ninth of the world level, Wang said, adding China's average per capita arable land is only one-third of the world average level and water resources, one-fourth of the world level.

So there is a great need for China to build an energy-saving society, he said.

China could save 335 million tons of coal by the year 2020 if buildings in all China's cities and towns are up to the energy-efficient standard, he noted. Also 1.7 billion tons of water can be saved each year by using water-saving equipment in all urban families.

Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao said in his government work report delivered at the National People's Congress (NPC) in March that the government will put the construction of energy-efficient and land-saving houses on the government agenda.

According to statistics from the Construction Ministry, the cost of a building that saves 60 percent of the energy per unit is only five to seven percent higher than ordinary buildings.

The ministry recently launched an ambitious plan. By 2020, China will transform all existing buildings into energy-saving ones. New buildings must embrace technology that could save 65 percent more energy per unit.