Maria David
THE 5th edition of the Omusati Regional Council’s Annual Wellness sports games has officially kicked off on Monday and will conclude on Friday.
The event started with a street match from the Regional office to the Olufuko Cultural Centre where the games are being held.
This year, the games are being hosted under the theme: “Our wellness, the road towards productivity.”
Minister of Urban and Rural Development Erastus Uutoni, who officially opened the games, said the annual wellness sport week is a result of regional councils realizing the need and importance of sports and recreation as key to employee wellness thereby creating a platform to network and develop relations, goodwill, and regional cooperation amongst one another.
Uutoni said wellness programs are primarily created to help workers improve and maintain employee health in and out of the workplace, which has a direct impact on increasing productivity within the workplace.
“It is a known fact that excessive workload increases mental and physical distress and could lead to low productivity given the constant pressure and overwhelming demands within our workplaces,” he said.
He added that not everyone knows how to manage stress and cultivate a work-life balance, and when employees constantly feel exhausted, their physical and mental abilities suffer, and their performance could take a fall.
Thus, Uutoni indicated that recreation helps manage stress, boosts physical activity, and ultimately contributes to improving the overall quality of life.
He noted that it is their understanding that team sports train them in social skills that can be very useful in their professional careers: communication, cooperation, coordination, negotiation and making decisions that have consequences for other people.
Uutoni said that the Regional games benefit the employees highly and foster good working relationships.
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