Scottish Highland estate seeks £12m buyer after mass tree planting as owner says 'mistakes' made

A global investment company that owns a Highland estate said ‘lessons have been learned” as the land hits the market after just three years in its hands.

Far Ralia in the Cairngorms, which is owned by abrdn Property Income Trust, is being marketed for £12 million - £4.5m more than it paid for it in 2021.

Far Ralia in the Caringorms is being sold for £12m after three years in the hands of a fund run by global investor fund abrdn. Picture: abrdn. | abrdn

The sale comes after 1.5m trees were planted by the firm in one of the largest natural capital schemes in the UK. The scheme will generate potentially lucrative carbon credits for every tonne of carbon dioxide the woodland removes from the atmosphere.

More than £2.5m of public money was approved by Scottish Forestry to plant the trees.

Criticisms have been made that public funding has increased the value of the privately-held land and that communities in the Kingussie area were not adequately consulted over the owner’s plans or any potential benefit to them from the net zero project.

Fraser Green, head of Natural Capital Investment at abrdn, said Far Ralia was being sold after shareholders voted to sell off the entire abrdn Property Investment Fund.

He said: “We have definitely had a bit of flack from representatives from the community who don’t feel that we consulted with them

“And there is an element of saying ‘we did, or we felt like we did and we are sorry that you don’t feel like you were consulted’. But we feel like we did go through a consultation process.

“There are lessons to be learned there in that community engagement is something that needs to be ongoing and we have tried to do that. Elements have been successful and others less so. We can improve the scale of it and the depth of it next time.”

READ MORE: Highland laird get £25m valuation for his estate given carbon offsetting potential - but describes price as a ‘scam’

Mr Green added: “In Scotland there is a sense that absentee parties have gone multiple times and done as they have pleased and communities are tired of that. They want to have a say and they want to be consulted and I think that is entirely fair.”

This month, Community Land Scotland and the Scottish Land Commission launched the Natural Capital Partnerships Project to ensure communities are involved in decisions about such projects and can benefit from them.

Meanwhile, Mr Green said abrdn will now shift its focus to working in conjunction with existing landowners to create natural capital projects rather than buying land. He said Far Ralia had been “incredibly valuable” - but that mistakes had been made.

Mr Green said: “We have put our money where our mouth is. We have learned a lot and there are things that we have done with Far Ralia that we wouldn’t do again, including basic things around designing woodlands and certain processes.

“But it is much better to be able to, dare I say, make mistakes and learn from them.”

In June, Scottish Forestry raised concerns about the standard of some tree planting at Far Ralia and ordered a series of remedial works to be carried out by October.

A spokesman for Scottish Forestry said: “We have been informed that these have now been completed and we will check the site again in due course to ensure that the planting is to the standard required.”

Mr Green said the rise in value for Far Ralia was due to the first phase of tree planting being finished, which came at a “very hefty capital cost”. He said: “That is obviously capital that a buyer doesn’t have to spend themselves and if they were acquiring Far Ralia as we did, they would be anticipating to do so.”