Port Stephens and Goonoo Goonoo: a review of the early period of the Australian Agricultural Company

In the early decades of European settlement in Australia men believed that large capital resources would be needed to develop the fine-wool industry. Between 1803 and 1821 Captain John Macarthur and Gregory Blaxland tried unsuccessfully to form pastoral companies. Such efforts failed prior to the visit of the Commissioner of Inquiry. Following the publication of the Report on the State of Agriculture and Trade in New South Wales, the Australian Agricultural Company was formed by a group of English merchants and bankers along lines approved by the Secretary of State for Colonies. The first British-Australian capital investment corporation operating in the pastoral and mining industries faced formidable developmental problems. It was not easy to transplant European stock, skills and habits of agriculture to a strange environment characterised by fire, flood and drought. Operating within the restrictions imposed by the peculiar nature of the colony of New South Wales and later, following the cessation of the transportation system, by the problems of labour shortage and economic depression, the Company learnt to contend with this new environment. In the course of this experience it made positive and lasting contributions to Australian industry and society. At the same time, it provided raw materials for British manufacturers. In the period preceding the mining of gold and the subsequent development of a large-scale and complex process of economic growth, the story of the Australian Agricultural Company reveals the difficulties faced by European man in adapting to the Australian environment