Tayvallich Estate
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“The opportunities present at Tayvallich are huge and the estate could be a massive asset to the business and its rewilding ambitions. The combination of large natural capital reserves and motivation to transition towards a low carbon high nature future is potent….”
SAC Consulting
Highlands Rewilding is a company with a mission to generate nature recovery and community prosperity through rewilding taken to scale. It aims to become a world leader in accelerating nature-based solutions that can help fight the existential and related crises of climate meltdown, biodiversity collapse, and social inequality, whilst helping to rebuild local economies.
The company will use its three estates as ‘Open air Natural Capital laboratories’. To ensure an evidence-based approach, the company makes extensive use of satellites, drone-based sensors, ground-based sensors, eDNA analysis, and observational work by ecologists to generate natural capital data. This data then informs the design of interventions on the land, for instance the felling of monoculture conifer plantations to be replaced with native woodland or restored peatland. It is hoped that these projects will act as an exemplar to encourage other landowners to pivot their land management to net-zero and nature positive practises.
Highlands Rewilding purchased the extensive Tayvallich (Taigh a’ Bhealaich) estate, in Argyll in May 2023. The estate is situated on the Tayvallich peninsula in the stunning Knapdale National Scenic Area. The estate is extensive and includes a wide range of marine and terrestrial habitat types. Work to date has largely focused on community engagement and building a collaborative model of community involvement (social impact and engagement – below) and baselining of current natural capital (environmental impact – below). The estate’s habitats vary in condition, according to the English Defra metrics, but much of the estate’s land is still designated as a SSSI (Site of Special Scientific Interest) or a SAC (Special Area of Conservation). Despite this existing high natural capital value, there is much opportunity for an uplift in natural capital, including biodiversity, carbon sequestration and water retention and purification.
Whilst the projects are engaging with carbon markets to ensure their effectiveness, they are not pre-selling carbon or any other credits (known as PIUs – Pending Issuance Units). Instead, they aim to sell any credits after measuring change over a number of years (referred to as ‘ex-post’). Biodiversity credits are expected to generate a greater return in the future assuming, as expected, that a strong biodiversity credits framework will emerge in Scotland.
Read more about the company here.
Revenue Model
Ecotourism – offering high end accommodation and retreats (for leisure or businesses).
Highlands Rewilding will sell high integrity Natural Capital credits, such as carbon and biodiversity credits.
Consultancy offering data-driven land management advisory services to other neighbouring landowners with an offer to share in monetisation of natural capital.
Public/Grant Funding
A £194,700 FIRNS (Facility for Investment Ready Nature in Scotland) grant received to fund an `8 month ‘Joint Ventures for Scalable Community Benefits from Rewilding’ project across its three estates. The outcome of the project will be a series of investment-ready business plans for community joint ventures which capitalise on environmental improvements from rewilding, and the valuable ecosystem services they generate. They will be a mechanism for involving more people in nature restoration, boosting the economy, skills development, job creation and cohesion in local communities.
Legal Arrangements
Highlands Rewilding investors sign ‘Subscription Agreements’ which bind them to not selling their shares on to people who do not agree with their purpose and mission.
Parties Involved
To carry out research strategies, Highlands Rewilding has partnered up with a group of both local and UK-wide conservation organisations, ecologists and scientific specialists to develop surveying methods that will inform intervention plans and recommendations for rewilding. These include the University of Oxford, the University of Edinburgh, SRUC, University of the Highlands and Islands, University of Aberdeen, Agricarbon, Nature Metrics, Peatland Action and Plantlife.
Highlands Rewilding has worked closely with local community including the Tayvallich Initiative. The Tayvallich Initiative is a community body that came together to consider the implications of the 2023 sale of Tayvallich Estate and to reflect on future aspirations in the community. Both Highlands Rewilding and Tayvallich Initiative realised the strong alignment in their aspirations for the area and the estate.
Highlands Rewilding have gone on to both sell land to the community, set up a local management board and sign a truly landmark management Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Tayvallich Initiative which aims to deliver a unique triple-win partnership for community prosperity, nature restoration and the delivery of ethical profit to shareholders.
Highlands Rewilding is in discussion with other neighbouring landowners and groups (including the umbrella group Alliance for Scotland’s Rainforests) about establishing large, landscape-scale collaborations.
Environmental Impact
Creation and regeneration of native woodland, restoration of peatland and other habitats, including species rich grassland, will also sequester carbon. Carbon sequestration through ‘blue carbon’ opportunities such as marine wetlands and kelp farms will also be investigated.
Restoration of wetland and riverine habitats especially provide water quality improvements, improved water retention for natural flood management and reduction in wildfire risks.
Social Impact and Engagement
At Tayvallich, Highlands Rewilding began extensive community engagement before purchase and the community remains an active stakeholder in the project. This partnership is formalised in a Memorandum of Understanding which sets out, amongst other aspects:
- Maintaining or increasing the number of jobs on the estate and building local skills
- Increased security of tenure for tenants of houses or land on the estate.
- Development of housing and smallholding opportunities, including microenterprises such as regenerative or kelp farming.
- Establishment of a ‘community baseline’ of evidence, capturing characteristics that will be improved over time an a ‘Local Management Board’ to represent ongoing community interests.
In May 2023 Highlands Rewilding completed the sale, at cost, of Turbiskill Farmhouse and land (19 hectares) at Tayvallich to the local community body, Tayvallich Initiative. This sale brings a second house into community ownership with long-term letting.
The company is investigating supporting local Gaelic language and culture in the area in partnership with the Tayvallich Initiative.
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