Several islands that dot the ­Mississippi River were included in the sale of Project Razorback, a transaction involving 157,660 acres of ­hardwood and pine in ­Arkansas, Louisiana, and Mississippi that was named The Land Report’s 2024 Timberland Deal of the Year.

The portfolio was represented by the listing brokerage, LandVest, and ­purchased by Manulife Investment Management, the asset-management arm of Manulife Financial Corporation, from a fund managed by The ­Forestland Group.

The world’s leading timberland investment manager, Manulife manages more than 5 ­million acres of timberland. This acreage was included in its $480 million Forest Climate Fund, in part to produce high-quality carbon credits.

“Investors are showing ­confidence in forests as a top natural climate solution,” ­Manulife Managing ­Director Eric Cooperström said in a news release. “With the ­interest we have seen in the fund, we will continue to pursue natural climate solutions to drive new opportunities for impact and results for our clients.”

The ecosystem of the Mississippi River makes the region a prime location for timberland — along the riverbanks and even on land atop the water itself. With the acquisition of ­Project Razorback, Manulife has added land along the river that at times actually floods with seasonal rainfall.

“These are islands in the Mississippi,” says listing ­broker Jonathan Burt.

“Each tract came with a name, the location, the name of the access road, and then the height of the river gauge to determine when the road would be passable. There are three- to six-month logging opportunities on a lot of these properties. The rest of the year, the access road or even the property itself might be underwater,” Burt says.

The remote properties are valuable in terms of both timber production and the creation of carbon credits. According to Burt, “Razorback has one of the most intact ecosystems of any commercial timberland located in the southern US.”

“Every time you step out of the car on one of these properties, you have to be really careful. They are teeming with wildlife,” Burt says.

He adds, “Razorback is one of the largest ­natural-forest investments offered in the US South in recent history. It is a very nontraditional Southern timberland investment. There is just nothing else like it left in the South at such scale. These timberlands were definitely a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.”

Published in The Land Report Spring 2025.