Janez Podobnik was born on September 17, 1959 in Cerkno. After graduating from at the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Ljubljana in 1984, he worked as a general practitioner in Idrijsko and Cerkljansko. In 1990 he became mayor of the Municipality of Idrija, which at that time still included today's Municipality of Cerkno. After the creation of new municipalities he was mayor of Cerkno from 1994 until 1998. From 1990 he was also a municipal councillor.

He was first elected as a deputy to the National Assembly in 1992 and re-elected in 1996 and 2000. In November 1996 he was elected to the post of President of the National Assembly. At the parliamentary elections of 2000 he became the leader of the Deputy Group of the Slovenian People's Party, the deputy chair of the Committee on Foreign Policy, a member of the Constitutional Commission, a member of the Committee on Culture, Education, Youth, Science and Sport, a member of the Commission for the Rules of Procedure, and a member of the Commission for Relations with Slovenes in Neighbouring and Other Countries. In his most recent term he was a representative of the Slovenian People's Party, initially holding the position of Observer and afterwards as a Member of the European Parliament, where he was active on the Committee on Regional Policy, Transport and Tourism. As a member of the Delegation of the National Assembly of the Republic of Slovenia he also cooperated with the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe.

Minister Janez Podobnik is a fluent speaker of English.