Contributor(s): María Antonieta Alva, Rt. Hon. Gordon Brown, Jeremy Farrar, Dame Minouche Shafik, Zhu Min, Professor Andrés Velasco | The opening plenary will bring leading policy makers together to take stock of the immense challenges the COVID-19 pandemic has created around the world, and the global response so far. While the G20 has adopted a Global Action Plan, and international financial institutions have taken steps to mitigate the twin health and economic crises, much remains to be done. This session will explore the policy steps to be taken now to save lives and livelihoods and bring about a sustained recovery. Maria Antonieta Alva (@ToniAlvaL) is the Minister of Economy and Finance of Peru since October 2019. She has been working in Peru’s public administration for 10 years. In 2017, she was appointed General Director of Public Budget at the Ministry of Economy and Finance, where she conducted Peru’s public budget, and the formulation of the Public Budget Acts of 2018 and 2019. Between 2014 and 2017, she was the Chief of Strategic Planning and Budget at the Ministry of Education. Previously, she worked at the General Directorate of Public Investment and the General Directorate of Public Budget at the Ministry of Economy and Finance. María Antonieta Alva holds a Master’s in Public Administration in International Development (MPA/ID) from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government (USA), and a BA in Economics from Universidad del Pacífico (Peru). Rt. Hon. Gordon Brown (@OfficeGSBrown) is the United Nations Special Envoy for Global Education and former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. He is Chair of the Global Strategic Infrastructure Initiative of the World Economic Forum and also serves as Distinguished Global Leader in Residence of New York University. He served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 2007 to 2010. Previously, he served as Chancellor of the Exchequer from 1997 to 2007, making him the longest-serving Chancellor in modern history. Gordon has a PhD in History from the University of Edinburgh. Jeremy Farrar (@JeremyFarrar) is the Director of the Wellcome Trust. Before joining Wellcome in October 2013, Jeremy Farrar was Director of the Oxford University Clinical Research Unit in Viet Nam for 18 years. His research interests were infectious diseases and global health, with a focus on emerging infections. He has published almost 600 articles, mentored many dozens of students and fellows, and served as Chair on several advisory boards for governments and global organisations. He is a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences UK, the National Academies USA, the European Molecular Biology Organisation and a Fellow of The Royal Society. Jeremy was knighted in the Queen’s 2019 New Year Honours for services to global health. Professor Andrés Velasco (@AndresVelasco) is the Dean of the LSE School of Public Policy. He was the Minister of Finance in Chile between 2006 and 2010 and has held professorial roles at the Harvard Kennedy School and Columbia University´s School of International and Public Affairs. He was president of the Latin American and Caribbean Economic Association (LACEA) from 2005 to 2007. In February 2006 he received the Award for Excellence in Research from the Inter-American Development Bank. In 2013-16 he was a member of the Global Oceans Commission and during 2015-16 he co-chaired the Global Panel on the Future of the Multilateral Lending Institutions. In 2017-18 he was a member of the G20 Eminent Persons Group. He is the author of nearly one hundred academic articles, several academic books and two novels. He has served as a consultant to the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank, and to governments, central banks and private businesses around the world. Minouche Shafik is the Director of the London School of Economics and Political Science. An economist by training, she became the youngest vice-president in the history of the World Bank at the age of 36. Minouche returned to the UK in 2004 and rose to become the Permanent Secretary of the Department for International Development where she was responsible for the UK’s development assistance efforts around the world. She joined the IMF in 2011 as Deputy Managing Director with responsibility for many of the crisis countries in the Eurozone and the Arab countries in transition. From 2014-2017 she was Deputy Governor of the Bank of England, responsible for a balance sheet of almost £475 billion, and sat on all of the Bank’s major policy committees. She was made a Dame Commander of the British Empire in 2015. Zhu Min is currently the Chair of the National Institute of Financial Research at the PBC School of Finance, Tsinghua University. He was formerly a Deputy Managing Director at the IMF from July 2011 to July 2016. Before that, he was a Deputy Governor of the People’s Bank of China. Prior to his service at China’s central bank, he held various positions at the Bank of China where he served as Group Executive Vice president. Dr. Zhu also worked at the World Bank and taught economics at both Johns Hopkins University and Fudan University. Dr. Zhu received his Ph.D and M.A. in economics from Johns Hopkins University, an M.P.A. from the Woodrow Wilson School of Public International Affairs at Princeton University, and a B.A. in economics from Fudan University. Moderator: Professor Erik Berglof (@ErikBerglof) became the inaugural Director of the Institute of Global Affairs (IGA) in 2015. Previously he was the Chief Economist and Special Adviser to the President of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD). Prior to joining the EBRD in 2006, Erik Berglof held the position of Director of the Stockholm Institute of Transition Economics (SITE) and Professor at the Stockholm School of Economics and a Research Fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C. In 2017-2018 he served on the Secretariat of the G20 Eminent Persons Group on Global Financial Governance and on the Governing Board of the Institute for New Economic Thinking in New York. He is a Research Fellow and former Programme Director at the Centre for Economic Policy Research in London.  Co-moderator: Piroska Nagy-Mohacsi (@NagyMohacsi) is a macroeconomist and Programme Director of the Institute of Global Affairs (IGA) at LSE, where she is responsible for various global policy initiatives on financial resilience, growth and migration. She was Policy Director of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), overseeing strategic directions in Emerging Europe, Central Asia and North Africa as well as major policy initiatives. She was also responsible for the EBRD’s economic forecast and co-created and co-led the Vienna Initiative in 2008-15, a public-private crisis management and coordination platform in emerging Europe, and headed its Secretariat. Piroska worked in senior positions for the International Monetary Fund (IMF) between 1986 and 2008 with surveillance, policy advice and program responsibilities in Europe, Africa and Asia.  Caroline Mei is the Student Leader for this session. She is currently completing her Masters in Public Administration at LSE. The School of Public Policy (@LSEPublicPolicy) is an international community where ideas and practice meet. Our approach creates professionals with the ability to analyse, understand and resolve the challenges of contemporary governance. The Institute of Global Affairs (@LSEIGA) aims to maximise the impact of LSE's leading expertise across the social sciences by shaping inclusive and locally-rooted responses to the most important and pressing global challenges. This event is part of the Maryam Forum Launch: "From Rulership to Leadership: Early Lessons from the COVID-19 Pandemic". View the full programme here. The Maryam Forum is a new multi-year platform aiming to encourage the shift towards evidence-informed, transparent, accountable and inclusive leadership. Introduced on the global stage in Davos during the World Economic Forum (WEF) in January 2020, Maryam Forum is a collaboration between policy makers, academics, business leaders and media that engages the LSE across departments and disciplines. Together with our students – the leaders of tomorrow – we will convene Maryam Co-Labs, leading up to our first annual Global Conference in December. From climate change, health crises and other global emergencies, to industrial policy, populism and migration, these year-round working groups will tackle the most urgent challenges of our time - providing opportunities to exchange expertise and shape solutions, and unlocking the potential for inclusive and sustainable leadership across all regions of the world.