Bringing the issues to the table

The Americas Roundtable is the Biennial of the America’s primary component of public dialogue. Roundtables on seven topics are scheduled, including education, poverty reduction, energy and climate change, women in leadership, health, trade and philanthropy.

Each roundtable will take place in front of large public audiences in the Ellie Caulkins Opera House in Denver. Each is expected to incorporate on the stage 10 to 12 participants. Engaged dialogue is the central element of the format. Once each roundtable gets underway, prepared remarks thus give way to candid, spirited, and unscripted conversation.

Roundtable participants will include senior government officials, business CEOS, non-profit leaders, academicians, journalists, and other professionals from throughout the Western Hemisphere. In addition to the seven roundtables, two special events are also scheduled: a Summit of Bilateral Ambassadors as a luncheon on July 8 and a Summit of former Heads of States as a roundtable on July 12.

Involving citizens from most of the 35 countries in the Western Hemisphere, The Americas Roundtable is designed as a public call to action, all in an effort to identify common challenges, seek joint opportunities, and promote collaboration.

Here are today’s Americas Roundtables:

The Americas Roundtable on Poverty Reduction:
Politics and Strategies

Roundtable Focus: Nearly 200 million Latin Americans, or 37 percent of the total population, still live in poverty, leaving the Western Hemisphere as one of the most income-unequal regions in the world. In response, a broad spectrum of governments, private enterprise, and non-governmental organizations have dedicated considerable time, talent and resources to fighting poverty.

Initiatives include: support for conditional cash transfer programs; improving social services such as education, health, and housing; spearheading social entrepreneurship, micro-credit, and other banking services; protecting and promoting human rights; increasing access to technology; and encouraging greater political participation. Where has success actually occurred? What initiatives have worked and why? What democratic institutions inside countries are most important to engage in order to ensure effective poverty reduction?

The Americas Roundtable on Health:
Transnational Threats

Roundtable Focus: In almost all countries in the Americas, chronic diseases such as diabetes cancer, heart disease, and respiratory conditions have now replaced communicable diseases as the leading causes of illness, disability, and death. Obesity is an underlying condition of many of these diseases, and a recent study by the World Health Organization predicts an increasing trend in obesity as Latin American countries emerge from poverty.

Even so, communicable diseases such as the H1N1 flu virus and drug-resistant tuberculosis persist as growing threats, as well. What incentives can governments and companies provide to combat these transnational threats? What did the world learn from Mexico’s proactive and public actions regarding H1N1? How do health care systems vary throughout the Western Hemisphere, and how can what works in one system be applied toward improvements in others?

Go here to learn more or buy tickets for the Americas Roundtables.
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