This year’s extensive speaker lineup includes Cesar Cernuda (President of Microsoft Latin America), Fredesvinda Montes (Senior Financial Specialist at the World Bank), Laxman Narasimhan (CEO of PepsiCo Latin America), Monique Skruzny (CEO of INSPIR Group), and Brett Perlmutter (Head of Google Cuba), among several other Latin American leaders across an array of industries.

Cuban music artist Cimafunk will also be speaking at the event and performing a live show.

The panel for this year’s event aligns with the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals, a call to action for all countries to promote prosperity while protecting the planet. The primary mission of the event will be to assess how the Latin American region can overcome its economic, social, and environmental challenges to become a model for development in the global context.

During the discussion, Kinguti emphasized the strong presence of Latin American students at Wharton. “The Latin American Student Association”, she noted, “is the largest cultural association in the entire community.”

Gonzalez-Rosell added that it takes a team of approximately 60 Latin American students working across schools to put this annual conference together.

He further delineated on a robust catalogue of programming featured in this year’s event. The conference will address issues of corruption, inequality, environmentalism, transportation, health care, and education in the context of Latin America’s development. Perspectives from both the private and public sectors will be in attendance to collectively evaluate these intractable challenges.

Rafael Krausz emphasized the key role that Latin America’s burgeoning tech industry is already contributing to the revitalization of the continent. He noted numerous companies featured in this year’s conference disrupting Latin American environmental, infrastructural, financial, and communication industries.

“I think that these technology companies are helping to bridge the gap in Latin America,” he told AL DÍA.

To learn more about WHALAC and purchase tickets to the two-day conference, visit www.whalac.com.