Thetis Abrera Mangahas (Global FWN100™ 2014) and Author, DISRUPT 2.0. Filipina Women: Daring to Lead, is a senior labor and migration specialist, honed from over forty years of professional experience in Philippine government administration and UN international development cooperation on labor migration, forced labor and human trafficking and child labor.
A magna cum laude graduate of the University of the Philippines’ School of Economics, Thetis completed her graduate degree (1978) at the London School of Economics and Political Science. Considered a pioneer of the Philippine overseas employment program, she rose through the ranks of the Overseas Employment Development Board and its successor organization, the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration.
She then pursued an international development cooperation career with the UN’s International Labour Organization (ILO) with duty assignments in Sri Lanka, Geneva (covering Eastern Europe) and Bangkok, Thailand. She capped her career as Deputy Regional Director for Policy and Programmes of the ILO’s Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific, overseeing multi-country development cooperation programs on child labor, labor migration, and human trafficking,
Now retired from the ILO since 2015, Thetis continues her advocacy for development and migrant worker protection as an active Fellow of Social Weather Stations which she co-founded in 1985. She also currently serves as a Board member of the Student Catholic Action of the Philippines and the Angel C. Palanca Peace Foundation.