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Bush Heritage Australia

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Bush Heritage Australia
Founded1991 (1991)
FocusConservation
Location
  • Melbourne, Australia
Area served
Australia
MethodAcquisition
Members54,000 supporters[1]
Key people
Bob Brown
RevenueA $42,933 (2025 August)[1]
Employees189 staff [2]
Websitebushheritage.org.au
Formerly called
Australian Bush Heritage Fund

Bush Heritage Australia is a non-profit organisation with headquarters in Melbourne, Australia, that operates throughout Australia. It was previously known as the Australian Bush Heritage Fund. Its vision is: Healthy Country, Protected Forever.

It works under three Impact models:

  1. Purchasing land (see 'Reserves' heading below), assessed as being of outstanding conservation value, from private owners, to manage as wildlife reserves in perpetuity.
  2. Investing in partnerships with Aboriginal groups, who are often owners of vast estates. Bush Heritage supports the development and implementation of Healthy Country Plans.
  3. It partners with farmers to support conservation work and aims to have an influence over 10 million hectares of agricultural land by 2030.

It does so to protect endangered species and preserve Australia's biodiversity. It's 2024-25 Impact Report stated it was contributing to the protection of 22.5 million hectares on its reserves and partnership lands. There were 9,268 native species recorded on its reserves and partnership properties, including hundreds of threatened species.[3]

History

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Bush Heritage Australia was founded in 1990 by Bob Brown who purchased two forested properties in Tasmania, adjoining the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Site, to save them from being woodchipped. He used the money of his Goldman Environmental Prize as a deposit, borrowing the rest and setting up the Australian Bush Heritage Fund.[4]

The organization subsequently developed, first in a small way in Tasmania, before expanding to the Australian mainland, and has grown with the assistance of regular subscribers and other donors.[5]

Doug Humann AM led Bush Heritage Australia as CEO from 1997 to 2011, raising its profile nationally. (As of 2021 he is chair of Landcare Australia.)[6] Gerard O'Neill took over from 2011 until 2018, then Heather Campbell was CEO from 2019 until 2023 and Rachel Lowry is the current CEO (appointed at the start of 2024).[7]

In 1997 Bush Heritage acquired the lease of Erith Island, an island in the Kent Group, Bass Strait, used for cattle grazing. It was relinquished to the Tasmanian Government in 2002 for incorporation into the Kent Group National Park.[8]

In 2011 Bush Heritage entered into a ten-year agreement with the Wunambal Gaambera Aboriginal Corporation, the "first long-term agreement in Australia between traditional landowners and a non-government conservation organisation". Many others have since followed. The Healthy Country Plan developed by the two groups helps to manage the Indigenous Protected Area (IPA) within the Mitchell River National Park in the Kimberley region in Western Australia.[9] Bush Heritage now has an extensive Aboriginal Partnerships Program.

Aims

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Bush Heritage Australia is striving for the long-term protection of Australia's biodiversity through the acquisition and management of land, water and wildlife of outstanding conservation significance. To do so it focuses its attention and investment on broad 'priority landscape' regions across Australia, selected for a combination of criteria, including the number of threatened species and ecosystems, the number of endemic species, the general condition of the lands, expected climate change impacts and existing staff and resources deployed in the region. Care of Bush Heritage owned properties includes the rehabilitation of degraded land, the control of introduced herbivores and predators, the use of fire as a management tool, consultation and co-operation with neighbouring landowners and Traditional Custodians, as well as with government departments, and the creation of habitat corridors.

Bush Heritage Australia also has a conservation science program led by Bruce Webber.[10] They study the conservation of animal and plant species.[10][11]

Governance

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Bush Heritage is run by an independent board of directors skilled in land management and conservation, around 200 paid staff and many volunteers. In 2024-25 Bush Heritage had over 50,000 supporters and hundreds of highly skilled volunteers (contributing over 47,233 hours in 2024-25) who are given opportunities to visit and work on the reserves. Details of income and expenditure can be found in the Impact Report on its website.[1]

Reserves

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As of October 2025, Bush Heritage had 46 reserves and was working with many partners contributing to the protection of 22.5 million hectares:[1]

See also

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References

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  1. ^ a b c d "Impact Report 2024-25". Bush Heritage Australia.
  2. ^ "Impact Report". Bush Heritage Australia.
  3. ^ "Bush Heritage Australia - Impact Report". Bush Heritage Australia. 25 August 2025. Retrieved 13 October 2025.
  4. ^ Our Patron. Bush Heritage Australia.
  5. ^ "Our History". Bush Heritage Australia. Retrieved 21 July 2022.
  6. ^ "Board of Directors". Landcare Australia. 3 June 2020. Retrieved 8 August 2021.
  7. ^ "Heather Campbell, CEO". Bush Heritage Australia. Retrieved 21 July 2022.
  8. ^ Brothers, Nigel; Pemberton, David; Pryor, Helen; & Halley, Vanessa. (2001). Tasmania's Offshore Islands: seabirds and other natural features. Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery: Hobart. ISBN 0-7246-4816-X
  9. ^ "Wunambal Gaambera Partnership". Bush Heritage Australia. Retrieved 11 November 2020.
  10. ^ a b "Endangered cute critters crucial to WA habitat". The West Australian. 5 June 2018. Retrieved 5 December 2019.
  11. ^ "Conservation Science". Bush Heritage Australia. Retrieved 5 December 2019.
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