Justin Yifu Lin, chief economist for the World Bank and long one of China’s leading economists, will speak April 29 at the University of California, Davis, about “Making the Poor More Resilient to Overcome Future Crises.”

His lecture is free and open to the public, and will begin at 4 p.m. in the Vanderhoef Studio Theatre of the Robert and Margrit Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts. His presentation is sponsored by the Giannini Foundation of Agricultural Economics.

The World Bank is an international institution, owned by 186 member nations. Its goal is to reduce poverty by providing financial and technical assistance to developing countries.

Lin, who has been the World Bank’s chief economist since June 2008, guides the bank’s intellectual leadership and plays a key role in shaping its economic research agenda. His research program examines the industrialization of rapidly developing countries, with a focus on why growth is lagging in poor regions.

Before joining the World Bank, Lin served for 15 years as professor and founding director of the China Centre for Economic Research at Peking University. He remains on leave from Peking University while serving at the World Bank.

Lin, who is the World Bank’s first chief economist from a developing country, received his doctoral degree in economics from the University of Chicago in 1986. He is the author of 18 books, including “The China Miracle: Development Strategy and Economic Reform,” which has been published in seven languages, and “Economic Development and Transition: Thought, Strategy, and Viability,” which is available in Chinese and English.

In China, he has served as a deputy of China’s People’s Congress and vice chairman of the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce. He also has been a member of several national and international committees, including the United Nations Millennium Task Force on Hunger, the Eminent Persons Group of the Asian Development Bank, and the National Committee on United States-China Relations.

About UC Davis

For more than 100 years, UC Davis has engaged in teaching, research and public service that matter to California and transform the world. Located close to the state capital, UC Davis has 32,000 students, an annual research budget that exceeds $600 million, a comprehensive health system and 13 specialized research centers. The university offers interdisciplinary graduate study and more than 100 undergraduate majors in four colleges — Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, Biological Sciences, Engineering, and Letters and Science. It also houses six professional schools — Education, Law, Management, Medicine, Veterinary Medicine and the Betty Irene Moore School of Nursing.