Professor David Yencken AO, Secretary of the Ministry for Planning and Environment from 1982-1987.

David Yencken is Professor Emeritus at the University of Melbourne, Patron of the Australian Conservation Foundation, and founder and chair of the Australian Collaboration, a collaboration of peak national community bodies.

He was the founder of Merchant Builders and Tract Consultants winners of many design awards. He was the inaugural Chair of the Federal Government Australian Heritage Commission and then Secretary for Planning and Environment, Government of Victoria.

Professor Yencken has been a member of the Australian National Commission for UNESCO and has represented Australia twice at World Heritage Committee meetings. He has been a member of the Prime Minister’s Urban Design Task Force and chair of the Design Committee of the Australia Council. He has been Head of the School of Environmental Planning at the University of Melbourne, President of the Australian Conservation Foundation and a member of the Commonwealth State of the Environment Advisory Council. He has served on many other government and university bodies.

He has written or edited seven books and many essays and articles and has received many individual prizes and awards.