Keith Bradby OAM
CEO, Gondwana Link Ltd
As a young man in the late 1970s, running a beekeeping business in Ravensthorpe, Keith started his long-time advocacy for the ecological values of south-western Australia, and the empowerment of local communities. From 1980-1985, he was part of a small group of people who achieved an end to state government efforts to open up large tracts of public land for farming.
In the 1980s, Keith also helped establish the Twertup Field Studies Centre and the Fitzgerald Biosphere Project, and he worked with some of Australia’s earliest landcare farming groups along WA’s south coast.
In late 1988, Keith moved to Perth to work at a policy level in state government, and from late 1989, he began an intense effort to stimulate and support landcare efforts in the Peel Harvey Catchment south of Perth. In 1997, Keith’s book ‘Peel-Harvey: the decline and rescue of an ecosystem‘ was published.
From 1996-2002, he worked with the State Minister for Agriculture to protect native vegetation on farms from land clearing. This included increasing support for landholders to look after bush on their properties (unfortunately, these significant protections and incentives were later weakened by subsequent state governments).
In 2002, Keith was a key part of establishing Gondwana Link, which has remained his primary focus for the past 21 years. During this time he was also a founding member of the WA Landcare Network, which he Chaired from 2017-2019.
Keith Bradby: Go west young man?
With his enquiring mind, Gondwana Link’s Keith Bradby is always reading and listening, both to learn more and to find effective ways to bring about change. Since the mid-1970s, he has been intensely involved in major efforts to change land use in south-western Australia, including ending land clearing, promoting landcare and launching large-scale ecological restoration plantings. Here’s Keith, tracing the origins of his landcare ethic, Gondwana Link and some of what has been achieved along the Link, so far.
One thousand kilometres of hope
What is Gondwana Link? Sitting under a grand old salmon gum in Ngadju country, Keith Bradby explains how working with local people to tackle habitat loss enabled Gondwana Link to take an intractable problem and turn it into something quite achievable.
Balancing nature: the south-west of Australia
From the ABC Science archives, this 2008 story focuses on the biodiversity hotspot of south-western Australia and features conservationists, ecologists and scientists to find out how conservation is succeeding both in small pockets of habitats and across extensive areas of landscape.