On the English-Scottish border a small species of butterfly, the northern brown argus, has fended off one of the biggest investors in the UK.<\/p>\n
Todrig, with its heath moorlands and hundreds of species of flora and fauna, represents an investment that could save Britain\u2019s wealthiest families millions of pounds in inheritance tax<\/a>.<\/p>\n But first the ground needs to be cleared, and sown with commercial tree saplings \u2013 a plan that has been defeated, for now, by the tiny butterfly.<\/p>\n \u201cNo one wants this,\u201d says Camilla Fowler, who chairs the local Lilliesleaf, Ashkirk and Midlem community council. \u201cThis kind of forestry scars the landscape and replaces it with monocultural, dark trees that harms our biodiversity.\u201d<\/p>\n A northern brown argus butterfly (Aricia artaxerxes). Photograph: Oliver Smart\/Alamy<\/p>\n Todrig \u2013 the size of about 560 football pitches \u2013 is the site of just one of many battles unfolding along the border, as big investors move in on vast expanses of land that can be stripped back and replanted for the mass production of timber.<\/a><\/p>\n The \u201cvulnerable\u201d status of the northern brown argus has halted plans for a forest plantation in Todrig, after a legal challenge forced the local environmental regulator to carry out more checks.<\/p>\n But Gresham House, the \u00a311bn City of London investor that bought the land for \u00a312m in 2022 \u2013 six times its price just three years before \u2013 is still aiming to turn the land into a tree farm.<\/p>\n Now, as demand for these tax-break trees grows, campaigners are warning that investors are in danger of putting further strain on natural grassland and forests across the UK.<\/p>\n Camilla Fowler at Todrig in the Scottish Borders, where plans for commercial woodland are being challenged. Photograph: Murdo MacLeod\/The GuardianLucrative business<\/p>\n \u201cThere is an enormous difference between Sitka spruce trees and native woodland, and other types of habitats such as meadows and calcareous grassland in terms of the wildlife they support,\u201d says David Lintott, a barrister who has led the legal campaign against the forestry plan at Todrig via his company Restore Nature.<\/p>\n But land is increasingly being targeted for commercial forests. Only an hour away from Todrig at Stobo Hope, the ground has already been cleared, ploughed and sown with rows of tree saplings by a \u201cforestry carbon sequestration fund\u201d, managed by the London-based company True North Real Asset Partners. The investment company argues that Sitka spruce is more effective at capturing carbon compared with native trees \u2013 and that they can grow and cut down between two and three \u201ccycles\u201d of Sitka spruce in a single cycle of native woodland.<\/p>\n It is a lucrative business for investors. Industry calculations suggest the value of woodland has roughly doubled over the past decade, exceeding gains from some other physical assets such as commercial property \u2013 and helped by increasing numbers of wealthy families who have turned to the sector for a break from inheritance tax.<\/a><\/p>\n The UK has one of the highest rates of inheritance tax in the world, at 40% above certain thresholds. Most married couples can pass down \u00a31m tax free to their children, including a \u00a3250,000 allowance for their main residence.<\/p>\n The non-native Sitka spruce plantation at Stobo Hope is managed by London-based True North Real Asset Partners. Photograph: Murdo MacLeod\/The Guardian<\/p>\n But a range of other reliefs has meant that for much of the past decade, wealthy families have often paid the tax at a much lower rate.<\/p>\n Rachel Reeves took an axe to some of these reliefs at her maiden budget, introducing a \u00a32.5m limit on business and agricultural property relief<\/a>. But one lucrative area escaped the chancellor\u2019s attention: woodland.<\/p>\n Commercial forests \u2013 where trees are planted and felled as soon as possible for timber \u2013 can qualify for business property relief after just two years of ownership. Investors in woodland also do not pay income or corporation tax on the value of growing timber, and no capital gains tax is due when trees are felled.<\/p>\n The special allowances mean wealthy families can save millions of pounds in inheritance tax if they park their money in woodland. If, for example, a couple owned \u00a3100m worth in woodland and it qualified for business property relief, their estate would inherit \u00a35m tax-free, and the remaining \u00a395m would be taxed at half the normal rate.<\/p>\n \u201cAnyone seriously thinking about estate planning should consider woodland as part of the mix,\u201d says Anton Baskerville, of Woodlands.co.uk, a provider in the sector. \u201cBuying land that is commercially managed is one of the key options available.\u201d<\/p>\n The tax break is not widely known \u2013 which means that every time the rules change, even if they get stricter, it helps to spark new waves of interest from investors, says Baskerville. \u201cWe see spikes when it hits the news cycle.\u201d<\/p>\n Forestry sales chart<\/a>Super-rich backers<\/p>\n Dr Josh Doble, the director of policy and advocacy at the campaign group Community Land Scotland<\/a>, says increasing demand for woodland is coming from buyers seeking a way to reduce their tax burden.<\/p>\n The super-rich <\/a>have long dabbled in woodland. The private equity tycoon Guy Hands<\/a> and his wife, the hotelier Julia Hands, have been investors in the sector. In 2019, the Times reported that Julia had spent \u00a367m on almost 30,000 acres in Scotland, and her husband owned 14,000 acres in Perthshire.<\/p>\n Last summer they sold Griffin Forestry Estate for \u00a3145m to Gresham House, valued at more than \u00a326,000 a hectare, one of the highest valuations on record for a woodland. The couple are based in Guernsey. Guy Hands declined to comment.<\/p>\n The billionaire Danish retail magnate Anders Povlsen is the biggest private landowner in Scotland. His company, Wildland, had land worth \u00a3337m as of 31 July 2025, according to accounts filed at Companies House. However, unlike other ventures in the sector by the super-rich, it is a loss-making rewilding project \u2013 restoring native woodland and species on their estates \u2013 which makes it unlikely that the Povlsen family could use it towards IHT reliefs.<\/p>\n But it is Gresham House, which specialises in \u201cnatural capital\u201d, that has become one of the most prolific private sector buyers of land in the sector \u2013 with many wealthy families buying stakes in woodland ownership via its funds.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s shocking how quickly Gresham House has acquired so much land,\u201d says Doble. \u201cIn the space of 14 years it has acquired about 73,000 hectares. That is just in Scotland \u2013 in our view that works directly against what the Scottish government has been trying to do for the last 25 years in reforming land ownership.<\/p>\n \u201cWith institutional landowners, you do not get the same level of accountability and collaboration. You don\u2019t get transparency or benefit sharing when you\u2019re dealing with a huge asset manager.<\/p>\n \u201cIt is a case of how do you know how to hold them account if you disagree with the planting that is happening? You\u2019re dealing with big estates, so often there is housing involved, local people work and live there. But there is not a conversation.\u201d<\/p>\n Funds managed by Gresham House collectively control thousands of hectares of land. Campaigners say that makes the company one of the largest private landowners in Scotland, although Gresham House denied this claim, arguing that the land is ultimately owned by its investors.<\/p>\n Backers of Gresham\u2019s forestry funds include the trusts of wealthy families and prominent business people. Investors in its Forestry Partnership \u2013 which has net assets of \u00a3162m \u2013 included the late banker Lord Rothschild, Jeremy Darroch and Nicholas Ferguson, formerly of Sky, the Marquess of Linlithgow, and the family of the late hotel magnate Reo Stakis<\/a>, according to filings at Companies House.<\/p>\n