David Western is chairman of the African Conservation Center in Nairobi, Kenya. He began research into savannas ecosystems at Amboseli National Park in 1967, looking at the interactions of humans and wildlife. His work, unbroken since then, has served as a barometer of changes in the savannas and a test of conservation solutions based on the continued coexistence of people and wildlife.
Western directed Wildlife Conservation Society programs internationally, established Kenyas Wildlife Planning Unit, and chaired the African Elephant and Rhino Specialist Group. He was founding president of The International Ecotourism Society, chairman of the Wildlife Clubs of Kenya, director of the Kenya Wildlife Service and founder of the African Conservation Centre in Nairobi. He is an adjunct professor in biology at the University of California, San Diego, and the University of Minnesota.
Westerns publications include Conservation for the Twenty-first Century (Oxford University Press, 1989), Natural Connections: Perspectives in Community-based Conservation (Island Press, 1994) and In the Dust of Kilimanjaro (Shearwater, 2001). He is currently conducting a study on climate change in the Kenya-Tanzania borderlands in collaboration with University of California San Diego, University of York, Missouri Botanical Gardens and African Conservation Center.
