Noriyuki Shikata is Cabinet Secretary for Public Affairs under Prime Minister Kishida. He was Director General, Economic Affairs Bureau of Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA). His other prior positions include: Deputy Chief of Mission, Embassy of Japan in China; Deputy Director General, Asian and Oceanian Affairs Bureau, MOFA; Political Minister, Embassy of Japan in the U.K.; Director of Global Communications, Prime Minister’s Office. He was also Visiting Professor at Kyoto University’s Graduate School of Law/Public Policy. He holds Master in Public Policy (MPP) from Harvard Kennedy School of Government. His Twitter handle is: @norishikata.

Dr. Naoyuki Yoshino is Professor Emeritus at Keio University (Economics), Tokyo, Japan and was Dean/CEO of the Asian Development Bank Institute (ADBI)(2014-2020). He served as the Lead-Chair of T20-Japan in 2019. He obtained his PhD from Johns Hopkins University under supervision of Sir Alan Walters who was chief economic advisor to Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher of UK. He received honorary doctorates from University of Goteborg (Sweden) and Matin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg (Germany). Dr. Yoshino has been a visiting scholar at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (United States) and a visiting professor at various universities including the University of New South Wales (Australia), Fondation Nationale des Sciences Politiques (France), and University of Gothenburg (Sweden). He has also been an assistant professor at the State University of New York at Buffalo and an economics professor at Keio University (1990-2014). Dr. Yoshino's professional career includes membership in numerous government committees. He has served as Chairperson of the Japanese Ministry of Finance's Council on Foreign Exchange as well as its Fiscal System Council (Fiscal Investment and Loan Program Section). Additionally, he has been a Board Member of the Deposit Insurance Corporation of Japan and President of the Financial System Council of the Government of Japan and President of Japan Academic Association of Financial Planning. He was named Director of the Japan Financial Services Agency's (FSA) Financial Research Center (FSA Institute, Government of Japan) in 2020 and he is also currently an Adjunct Professor at GRIPS and visiting Lecturer at University of Tokyo. He received the International Green Finance Lifetime Achievement Scientific Award from the Central Bank of Hungary held at Planet Budapest 2021 sustainability EXPO summit.

Andrijana Cvetkovikj has a Doctoral Degree from Nihon University, and an Executive MBA from the Fox School of Business, Temple University, and a Master Degree in Cinema and Media Studies from the National Academy of Theater and Film Arts of Sofia, Bulgaria. She is recipient of the the WIN Inspiring Women Worldwide Award 2022. Cvetkovikj was the first resident Ambassador of the Republic of Macedonia in Japan from 2014-2018. Cvetkovikj was also the Head of the Digital Diplomacy Unit (2013-2014)and the Public Diplomacy Unit (2018) at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Macedonia. She sits on the Board of Del Sole Corporation, and used to be an Executive Advisory Board Member of Cartier-Japan (2018-2020), promoting women’s entrepreneurship and mentoring. Cvetkovikj was a visiting professor at Kyoto University (2012), the International Center for Japanese Studies(2010-2011), the European University and other academic institutes. She is currently an Advisor to the OIST Foundation (the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology).

Cvetkovikj is the Founder & CEO of BrioNexus, Co., Ltd., Tokyo based consultancy firm, and of a non-profit organization Ambassadors of Change. She is a member of the Japan Board Diversity Network (JBDN), and the Worldwide Women Corporate Directors (WCD) Organization. She has been a speaker at the UN Conference for Climate Change, the World Economic Forum, and other venues. In 2018 she received the distinguished award Doctor Honoris Causa by the European University for contributions in the Sciences and Arts.