Sonomi Tanaka

Technical Advisor (Gender Equity), Sustainable Development and Climate Change Department, ADB

Sonomi is ADB's lead Gender Specialist and responsible for overseeing and providing advice on ADB-wide operations in support of gender equality and women’s empowerment. She has worked on gender and development, poverty reduction, social analysis, social protection, and community participation issues in Asia and the Pacific for nearly 20 years.

Blogs by this Author

  • Safe migration for women to reduce human trafficking risks

    Published on Monday, 03 March 2014

    Written by Sonomi Tanaka
     
    Radhika Coomaraswamy, a human rights lawyer and former UN Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women, once said: “Traffickers fish in the stream of migration." What does this mean? It means that trafficking is more likely to occur within a series of migration, when men and women are on the move in search of new opportunities, better incomes and better lives in unfamiliar and strange surroundings. 
     

  • Why invest in infrastructure and services that work for women

    Published on Tuesday, 05 March 2013

    When I was a student, I spent two and a half hours in hellish commuter trains each day as a Tokyo suburbanite. Being a teenager in a manga-like school uniform, I was often a target of groping, eve-teasing, stalking, and even “flashing” on the streets, in the trains, and at the stations.