Beijing University Professor Named As World Bank Chief Economist

February 8, 2008 Posted by China Briefing Reading Time: 2 minutes

Greater economic understanding of developing countries, Africa, seen as main benefits
By Chris Devonshire-Ellis

Washington, February 8th – Justin Lin Yifu, of Beijing University China Center for Economic Research, has just been named Chief Economist of the World Bank , the first time a Chinese national has held the position.

Professor Lin was born in 1952 in Taiwan, received a master’s degree from Beijing University, a MBA degree from National Chengchi University, and received a doctorate of economics from the University of Chicago. He served as a professor of the China Center for Economic Research of Beijing University, a facility he co-founded, until 1993.

World Bank President Robert Zoellick said Lin would bring to the bank the perspective of a developing country on agriculture issues, as well as on economic challenges in Africa, where China has aggressively sought trade and investment opportunities.

“As our first chief economist from a developing country, and an expert on economic development and particularly agriculture, Justin Lin brings a unique set of skills and experience to the World Bank Group,” Zoellick said. “I look forward to working closely with him on a number of areas, including growth and investment in Africa, opportunities for South-South learning (between developing countries), and bank instruments to better support countries hit by high energy and agriculture prices,” he said.

“China’s experiences can help the World Bank shore up its leading role in global poverty reduction,” Lin told Chinese news agency Xinhua.

Professor Lin’s appointment is not without some controversy. He fled Taiwan in 1979, defecting to Mainland China by swimming 2000 meters across the Fujian Straits, and is still regarded by the island as a renegade traitor, facing possible arrest and imprisonment if he returned. In China, he has had a key role in China’s economic modernization, providing extensive research into fiscal decentralization, the reform of state businesses, rice farm economics and general farm sector reform and modernization techniques. “The main reason I returned to China was because I wanted to make a contribution to the economic development and economic transition of China,” he said last year when delivering the prestigious Marshall Lectures at Cambridge University.

He also became a senior member of the important Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and the Institute of Rural Development Research in Beijing. His books include “Institution, Technology and Agricultural Development in China;” “China Miracle: Development Strategy and Economic Reform,” and “How Did China Feed Itself in the Past? How Will China Feed Itself in the Future?”

More recently, he has been named an economics professor at Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, and lectured at universities around the world. Professor Lin, 55, is expected to take his positions as the global development lender’s senior vice president for development economics and chief economist on May 31. He replaces Francois Bourguignon, who retired as the World Bank’s chief economist last year.