In 2010, an Australian family turned down millions to sell their Sydney land for housing, instead signing a conservation deal to clear invasive olive trees and plant 5,000 natives. Fifteen years later, their property became one of the region’s most valuable—not for what was built, but for the woodland that regrew.
In 2010, a fifth-generation farming family in western Sydney approached the New South Wales government with an unusual proposal. The Downes family, whose land sat on the urban fringe of one of Australia’s fastest-growing cities, offered their worst paddocks for an experiment with no local precedent. They proposed removing olive trees, planting thousands of native trees, and attempting to restore a…