Gillian Tett serves as US Managing Editor for the Financial Times. She writes weekly columns for the newspaper, covering a range of economic, financial, political and social issues. In 2014, she was named Columnist of the Year in the British Press Awards and was the first recipient of the Royal Anthropological Institute Marsh Award. In June 2009 her book Fool's Gold won Financial Book of the Year at the inaugural Spear's Book Awards. Ms. Tett's past roles at the FT have included US Managing Editor (2010-2012), AssistantEditor, Capital Markets Editor, Deputy Editor of the Lex column, Tokyo Bureau Chief, and a reporter in Russia and Brussels.

Christine Lagarde is a French lawyer and politician who has been the Managing Director (MD) of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) since 5 July 2011. Previously, she held various, senior ministerial posts in the French government: she was Minister of Economic Affairs, Finance and Employment, Minister of Agriculture and Fishing and Minister of Trade in the government of Dominique de Villepin. An anti-trust and labour lawyer, Lagarde was the first female chair of major international law firm Baker & McKenzie, between 1999 and 2004.

Born in Bogotá, Gloria Amparo Alonso is an Economist from the Universidad de los Andes, with a master in economics from the Universidad Nacional and a master in Public Policy from Columbia University in the United States.

Her technical vocation, management capacity and passion for public service have led her to hold prominent leadership roles, both in the private and public sectors.

She worked for 20 years at Banco de la República (Central Bank of Colombia), where she served as head of the external, financial and macroeconomic programming sectors. Also serving as director of the Communication and Economic and Financial Education Department, Office of the Governor.

Between 2009 and 2012 she worked in the Ministry of Finance as the director of macroeconomic policy during the administrations of both Óscar Iván Zuluaga and Juan Carlos Echeverry. In September 2015, Edgardo Maya Villazón, the Comptroller General of the Republic, appointed Gloria Amparo Alonso to the position of Vice Comptroller General, the second-in-command in this control entity. Here she led the project of institutional strengthening and modernizations of the Contraloría (Office of the Comptroller), which adjusted the entity´s auditing practices to international standards.

In August 2018, President Iván Duque named her director of the Departamento Nacional de Planeación (National Planning Department), DNP, where she will participate in the major discussions on economic and development issues taking place in the country. In its 60 years of history, Gloria Amparo Alonso is the fifth woman to head the DNP.

Paschal is the Fine Gael TD for Dublin Central and in June 2017 was appointed as the Minister for Finance & Public Expenditure and Reform.

Prior to his appointment as the Minister for Finance & Public Expenditure and Reform, he served, from May 2016-June 2017, as the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, and from July 2014-May 2016, as the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport. Paschal has also held the position of Minister for European Affairs at the Department of An Taoiseach and the Department of Foreign Affairs from July 2013-July 2014.

Paschal is a graduate of University of Dublin, Trinity College, with a degree in Politics and Economics and has attended St. Declan’s CBS, Cabra.

Mr. Dujovne holds a BA in economics from the Universidad de Buenos Aires and an MA from the Instituto Torcuato Di Tella. He worked for more than 10 years at Banco Galicia, the largest domestically owned bank of the country as the Chief Economist. He also served as a Government official: between 1997 and 1998 as the Chief of Advisors to the Secretary of the Treasury and in 1999 he was appointed as the representative of the Ministry of Finance at the Board of Directors of the Argentine Central Bank. Mr. Dujovne was also a consultant for the offices of the World Bank in Washington D.C and in Buenos Aires and director of Papel Prensa S.A. He was also a professor of “Topics of banking administration” at the Masters Program of the Universidad Torcuato Di Tella in Argentina. Currently serves as Minister of Treasury of Argentina.

Dr. Vera Songwe is an Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations and is the Executive Secretary of the Economic Commission for Africa. It is the first time in the Commission’s 60-year history that a woman has held the top leadership position. Listed by Forbes in 2013 as one of the “20 Young Power Women in Africa”, Dr. Songwe was also chosen by the Institut Choiseul pour la politique internationale et la géoéconomie (France) as one of its “African leaders of tomorrow” and has been included in the “Top 10 Female Business Leaders in Africa” published by the African Business Review in 2014. Dr. Songwe was named among the “100 Most Influential Africans of 2017” in the New African Magazine. She has a long-standing track record of providing policy advice and being instrumental in the results-oriented implementation of policy in the region and has published widely on governance issues, innovative finance and fiscal policy issues. One of Dr. Songwe’s most compelling qualities is her demonstrated strategic vision for the continent.