Maria Catalina E. Cabral

If there is a model for “Woman Infrastructure” in an organization dominated by male officials, it is Undersecretary Maria Catalina E. Cabral, who made history as the first female rank-and-file employee to reach the level of Undersecretary at the Department of Public Works and Highways – the government’s engineering and construction arm.

As the Undersecretary for Planning and Public-Private Partnership (PPP), Undersecretary Cabral oversees the DPWH’s infrastructure planning and programming, as well as the PPP projects that the department implements.

Undersecretary Cabral is a licensed civil engineer who holds two doctorate degrees in Business Management and Public Administration and is a Ph.D. candidate in Urban and Regional Planning at the University of the Philippines. She has also completed three master’s degrees in business and strategic economics, as well as certificates from Wharton Business School and Harvard Kennedy School in data analytics, government digital transformation, and public policy.

She holds the distinction of being the first female President of the Philippine Institute of Civil Engineers (PICE) for 2017-2018 and served as the National President of the Road Engineering Association of the Philippines from 2019-2021. In 2021, she also held the Professorial Chair in Engineering Science and Technology at the Polytechnic University of the Philippines.

Her competence, excellence, and commendable track record have earned her numerous awards and recognitions, including the 2021 PEZA Galing Pinas Ecozone Partnership Award, the 2020 Excellence Award from the Philippine Federations of Professional Associations, the 2018 Most Outstanding Alumni Award from the College of Engineering, and the 2021 Most Outstanding Alumni from the University of the East. She was also named the 2021 Outstanding Professional of the Year in Civil Engineering by the Professional Regulation Commission (PRC).

Additionally, the JCI Senate Philippines named her one of the Five Outstanding Filipino (TOFIL) Awardees Laureates for Government and Public Service in 2022. She has also received the Manila Times Global Excellence Award in 2023, the 2023 Brand Asia Award as Top Leader of Excellence in Humanitarian and Public Service, and the 2023 Philippine Resilience Awards for Women.

Beyond local recognition, she has been nominated for several international awards, including the World Federation of Engineering Organization’s GREE Women in Engineering Award in 2019, the United Nations Public Service Awards for SDG 5 - Gender and Equality in 2022, and the Asian Civil Engineering Coordinating Council (ACECC) Achievement Award in 2022. She has also recently been nominated for the 2024 Women’s International Network on Disaster Risk Reduction (WIN-DRR) and the Presidential GAWAD CES Award.

Undersecretary Cabral is also a commissioned officer in the Reserve Force of the Armed Forces of the Philippines with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel in the Philippine Army.