Wolf Ladejinsky

Who was Wolf Ladejinsky?

Wolf Isaac Ladejinsky was an influential American agricultural economist and researcher, serving first in the United States Department of Agriculture, then the Ford Foundation and later the World Bank. He was a key adviser on land reform to the governments of several Asian countries, including Japan from 1945 to 1954 as well as Mainland China and later Taiwan under Chiang Kai-shek, South Vietnam from 1955 to 1961 under Ngo Dinh Diem, and countries in Southeast Asia and the Indian subcontinent. His efforts in Japan and Taiwan were a striking success, but later efforts were frustrated. Improving the welfare of Asian farmers through agrarian reform was his goal throughout his long career, earning him praise as "no typical bureaucrat, but an impassioned reformer".