The former Department of Minerals and Energy had an establishment of 1 554 employees during the year under review. Of these posts, 1 350 were filled, translating to a vacancy rate of 13.1 per cent. The vacancy rate was highest among the highly skilled supervision salary band at 17.4 per cent. The expenditure on compensation of employees amounted to R403.3 million, which constituted 8.9 per cent of the R4.5 billion total voted expenditure. The training expenditure amounted to R7.3 million, which constituted 1.8 percent of the total expenditure on personnel.