Wildlife Australia Magazine

FIRST WORD

Wildlife conservation is all about the human impacts

JANE GOODALL’s life was all about making a positive impact on the natural world – then encouraging others to do the same.

Her life’s work involved giving animals a fair go, especially her beloved chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes).

Jane Goodall led by example, which began in 1960 when, while working as a secretary for famed British paleoanthropologist Louis Leakey, she accepted his invitation to observe and document the lives and behaviours of chimpanzees at the remote Gombe Stream National Park, Tanzania. Dr Goodall shocked the scientific world with discoveries that chimpanzees were far more intelligent than then understood, they made tools and used them, and they had strong societal structures and behaviours.

Dr Jane Goodall DBE is one of three people regarded as ‘giants’ of natural history and wildlife conservation globally, as outlined by five Australian conservation academics in The Conversation online magazine, just after Dr Goodall passed away on October 1.

The two remaining giants are legendary naturalist and broadcaster, Sir David Attenborough, 99, and marine biologist and oceanographer Sylvia Earle, 90, who is renowned for her deep diving sleuthing on environmental threats to our oceans.

In Australia, Dr Earle is not as well known to the general public as Sir David and, of course, Dr Goodall. The reason is the ongoing work of the Jane Goodall Institute Australia, and its Roots & Shoots free conservation curriculum-linked education programs that were introduced to 4000 Australian schools in 2020. Plus, Dr Goodall was a regular visitor to Australia.

The Jane Goodall Institute explains its work admirably with this quote from Dr Goodall:

“You cannot get through a single day without having an impact on the world around you … you have to decide what kind of difference you want to make.”