Currie & Brown appointed to Forestry and Land Scotland’s Newton Nursery

16 juin 2022

Currie & Brown has been appointed to provide project management services on Forestry and Land Scotland’s Newton Nursery near Elgin in Moray.

Forestry and Land Scotland (FLS) is an agency of the Scottish government responsible for managing and promoting Scotland’s national forests estate. 

At Newton Nursery, FLS contributes to delivering key outcomes of Scotland’s forestry strategy through growing and providing quality planting stock, which is used to replant areas felled for timber. The nursey underpins FLS’ annual tree planting operations of 25 million trees per year.

A £20 million investment from the Scottish government means the nursery can redevelop and expand the site, becoming more efficient, producing more trees and, importantly, allowing FLS to plays its part in helping Scotland reach net-zero carbon emissions. This project is a once-in-a-generation upgrade to the core part of FLS’ business activity.  

Designed by architect Oberlands, the Newton Nursery redevelopment will facilitate new and innovative ways of working to maximise growing success against an increasingly challenging environment. There will be new modern buildings, systems and machinery that will automate processes and support ongoing development at the site. New planting stock will help establish new forests across Scotland. There are ambitious plans to significantly develop FLS' in-house plant and seed supply team and the infrastructure that they use.  

Newton Nursery currently produces 7 million trees/annum, which is 28% of FSL’s current annual plant requirements. There is potential to increase Newton’s plant production capability in future years, resulting in a further 5-7 million trees/annum being produced.

Following our appointment in 2021 to assist FLS with the development of the consultant and design team strategy, Currie & Brown has won the contract to provide full project management services on the redevelopment. Construction is due to start in the spring of 2023, with the redevelopment aimed for completion late 2024.