U.N. Women is the United Nations organization dedicated to gender equality and the empowerment of women. A global champion for women and girls, UN Women was established to accelerate progress on meeting their needs worldwide.

Dr. Unni Krishnan is Plan International's head of disaster response and preparedness and a leading expert in the humanitarian sector. Over the past 20 years, he has worked on the front lines of various humanitarian situations, where people are faced with disasters, terror, epidemics and extreme weather events.

Upendo Mwingira is a leading expert in health systems and neglected tropical diseases. At RTI International, she serves as technical director of USAID’s Act to End NTDs | East program, a global flagship initiative to support governments in ending NTDs. A medical doctor by training, Mwingira has dedicated her career in public health to NTD research and implementation. Previously, she served in Tanzania’s Ministry of Health, where she led the national NTD control program.

Urmi Sengupta is a senior lecturer in spatial planning who is affiliated with Queen’s University Belfast. She has extensively researched and published about architectural, urban, and housing issues for cities in the global south, with a focus on Asia. She sits on the editorial boards of various academic journals and received her Ph.D. from Newcastle University.

Urvashi Aneja is an interdisciplinary researcher, policy analyst, and social entrepreneur from India. Her current work examines the ethics, social impacts, and governance of artificial intelligence in the global south. She is the founder and executive director of Digital Futures Lab, an associate fellow at Chatham House, and a nonresident fellow at the Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay. Urvashi holds a doctorate from the University of Oxford. Her research has been cited in leading national and global media publications and she has served on expert government committees on artificial intelligence and frontier technologies.

Uyi Stewart is the chief data and technology officer at data.org, where he oversees the delivery of programmatic initiatives to accelerate the power of data and AI to solve some of our pressing global challenges. He holds a doctorate in Linguistics, with about 25 years’ experience advancing data for social impact in both public and private sectors.

Uzra Zeya is the CEO and president of the Alliance for Peacebuilding, the leading global network for organizations working to end conflict and build sustainable peace worldwide. She served previously as acting assistant secretary for democracy, human rights, and labor and charge d’affaires at U.S. Embassy Paris.

Vaishnavi Behl is the global communications manager at Restless Development.

Val Smith is the director and head of corporate sustainability for Citi. She joined Citi in 2004 and oversees Citi’s global sustainability initiatives, including leading the bank’s sustainability strategy and goals in partnership with the businesses and providing expertise on related issues and trends. She also leads the development of Citi’s sustainability stakeholder engagement strategy and human rights approach.

Valentina Baiamonte, Ph.D., is a professional whose 10-year career blends academia, international organizations, and NGOs, all while advocating for environmental sustainability in the private sector. She previously worked at the World Business Council for Sustainable Development guiding companies in implementing ESG disclosure frameworks and tackling deforestation within the food and retail industries. Today, she supports companies in navigating the latest ESG disclosure frameworks and conducts ESG risk assessments and management across value chains.