Note Printing Australia

Note Printing Australia (NPA) is a wholly owned subsidiary of the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) that produces banknotes and passports. It was corporatised in July 1998 and is located in Craigieburn, Melbourne. NPA has its origins as a subsidiary of the Commonwealth Bank and was established in 1913 to print banknotes for Australia. After printing paper banknotes for Australia for 75 years, NPA introduced the first polymer banknote technology in 1988.

In the mid 1960s Australia was hit by forgeries of the newly introduced $10 paper decimal note. These forged notes were of a high quality and difficult to identify. In response, the Reserve Bank of Australia and Note Printing Australia commissioned the CSIRO to find better ways to secure the Australian currency. This led to the development of the polymer note, which the NPA took into production and introduced in 1988. NPA has since focused heavily in promoting the benefits of the polymer technology they developed. According to internal RBA documents, NPA's printing costs in 2012 were 34¢ per note. These notes contain trace amounts of tallow which is a hard animal fat and is often avoided by vegetarians and certain religious groups.

Note Printing Australia is a security printing facility, that uses a number of special printers not available to the general printing industry. These include printing presses manufactured by KBA-NotaSys.

NPA was mentioned in a leaked suppression order of the Victorian Supreme Count in Melbourne. The order, which forbids publication of corruption allegations against named government officials of Malaysia, Indonesia and Vietnam, includes a specific exemption allowing the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions to pass banned information on to NPA.

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