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The Department of Professional Education and Development (DPED) this week hosted the Ministry of Environment and Tourism senior management for a five (5) day training workshop on Project Management Essentials and Microsoft.

The training was geared at capacitating senior ministry officials on project management and ways of optimising and availing resources to achieve targets.

Delivering welcome and opening remarks at the commencement of the workshop on the 6th of June 2026, Acting Vice Chancellor Teaching and Learning, Professor Maria Nnyepi, expressed gratitude to the ministry’s senior management for choosing UB and for having made time from their busy schedules to attend the training.

Professor Nnyepi highlighted that their act alone demonstrated that project management was not merely an operational or technical matter but a leadership responsibility they had to prioritise. She further underscored the centrality of project management to attaining strategic priorities, resource coordination, managing risks and results delivery.

“This workshop is particularly important because the work of the Ministry of Environment and Tourism is inherently strategic, cross-cutting and implementation driven,” she said, adding that “the ministry operates in areas that are vital to national development; environmental protection; climate resilience; conservation, tourism growth, (and) policy areas.”

Professor Nnyepi noted that for senior managers, project management was essentially important because they were responsible for the success of projects within their portfolios.

Meanwhile, the Ministry of Environment and Tourism Deputy Permanent Secretary Corporate Services, Ms Neo Sebolao, described the objectives of the training as a strategic intent for officers to align with ministerial goals. Ms Sebolao stated that the training was meant to equip staff with the requisite skills to deliver on their daily tasks.

She commended the quality of UB courses and assured the ministry officials that post the training they would be able to get clarity in establishing ministerial objectives and how to solve emerging challenges.

For her part, the Deputy Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Environment, Professor Patricia Mogomotsi, urged the participants to ensure that the training was a worthy investment. Professor Mogomotsi emphasised the need to enhance government technocrats’ skills such that they were good project managers. She called for the participants to draw lessons from the training to break silos and ensure proper handling of government projects.