Currowan Starch

The Currowan Starch Factory

Burrawangs (Macrozamia communis) are abundant in the Nelligan-Batemans Bay area.

According to the Sydney Morning Herald of 23rd November 1920, ‘years ago Mr. Thomson, of Nelligen, discovered their (the Burrawang seeds’) starchy nature. He noticed a cart had run over one of these bulbs, and when the sun had dried the pulp a starchy matter remained. He investigated further, with the result that he and his family for years have been manufacturing starch for local use, which analysts have declared to be of a high quality.’ This was probably little more than reporting of local folklore because in 1871 a Nowra resident, Henry Moore, had documented a process he used to remove toxicity from the seeds of the Burrawang, and between 1913 and 1919 a factory producing starch from Burrawangs operated in Nowra.

In 1920, a syndicate of Sydney businessmen established the Austral Starch Company Limited to extract starch from the Burrawang plant. They acquired a ten-year lease over 31,000 acres of State Forest at Currowan (upstream from Nelligan) and a licence to ‘exploit the Burrawang industry in the Nelligen district’. They then erected a factory near the mouth of Currowan Creek along with a tramway that ran along Mimosa Street linking the factory to the town's wharf.

Production of Burrawang starch at Currowan began in January 1921. Initially it seems to have been very successful, with over 25 employees soon producing 2 tons of starch per week. This even led to plans to expand the factory.

However, by April 1923, the company had gone into liquidation and it was finally wound up in November of that year.

All that remains of the Currowan starch factory today is a listing of the site of the factory on River Road, Currowan, on the NSW Heritage Register.