From April 14 to 15, President Obama will join 34 heads of state and government in Cartagena, Colombia for the Sixth Summit of the Americas. The leaders will address this year’s theme, “Connecting the Americas: Partners for Prosperity,” which focuses on the role of physical integration and regional cooperation, as well as other key areas including poverty and inequality, citizen security, disasters and access to technology.

On April 5, in advance of the President Obama’s trip to the Summit, the Latin America Initiative at Brookings hosted Leonardo Martínez-Díaz, deputy assistant secretary for the Western Hemisphere at the U.S. Department of the Treasury, for an overview of key economic trends in Latin America and the Caribbean and an outline of the administration's economic policy priorities in the region. Following his opening remarks, Mauricio Mesquita Moreira, principal economist at the Inter-American Development Bank, joined the discussion. Brookings Senior Fellow Daniel Kaufmann will moderate the discussion.