Some four hundred farmers from the different parts of the Cordillera formally received their respective Certificate of Land Ownership Awards (CLOAs) to legitimize their ownership of the lands that they currently tend during the simultaneous distribution of the titles to various agrarian reform beneficiaries (ARBs) nationwide.
The distribution of the CLOAs in the region was led by regional director Samuel Solomero of the Cordillera office of the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR-CAR) which coincided with the signing into law of the New Agrarian Emancipation Act by President Ferdinand R. Marcos, Jr.
Solomero said that there were some 392 e-titles that were given to the 400 farmers covering an area of more than 477.159 hectares of agricultural lands in the different parts of the region.
The new law is the fulfillment of the promise made by the President during his first State of the Nation Address (SONA) last year where he requested Congress to pass the law condoning the debt incurred by farmers from land awarded to them under Presidential Decree (PD) 27, Republic Act (RA) 6657 and RA 9700.
Further, the law condones the amortization of principal payments, interests and penalties on the land they are presently tilling, in what was considered as the most important piece of agrarian legislation passed since the whole country was declared an agrarian reform area, by then President Ferdinand E. Marcos, Sr. in October 1972.
Some 610,054 ARBs from the different parts of the country who have incurred more than P57.6 billion in payables to the land Bank of the Philippines (LBP) will benefit from the implementation of the new agrarian law.
Under the law, the government will also assume the obligation of some 10,201 ARBs tilling more than 11,531.24 hectares of land to pay the remaining balance of the direct compensation due to the concerned land owners under the voluntary land transfer or the direct payment scheme amounting to more than P206.25 million
Of the more than 32,000 land titles that were simultaneously distributed nationwide, some 17,837 are electronic land titles under the Support to Parcelization of Lands for Individual Titling Project (SPLIT) benefitting 6,526 ARBs covering some 23,247.52 hectares of land.
The balance of 13,994 emancipation patents (Eps) and CLOAs benefiting some 12,945 ARBS covering more than 7,378.38 hectares of agricultural lands.
In Abra, there were 51 e-titles that were distributed to some 54 ARBs covering an area of 106.73 hectares in the towns of San Juan, La Pax, Bucay, Luba and Licuan-Baay while there were 8 e-titles that were given to some 8 ARBs in Apayao covering an area of 12.0346 hectares in the towns of Luna and Sta. Marcela.
Benguet got the highest number of e-titles that were distributed with 274 with 285 ARBs covering an area of 299.07 hectares of agricultural land in the country’s Salad Bowl, particularly in the towns of Bakun, Kapangan, Atok, Tuba, Bokod, Sablan, Tublay and Itogon while there were some 10 ARBs in Ifugao who were given the 10 e-titles covering an area of 23.99 hectares of land in the town of Lamut.
In Tabuk city, Kalinga, there were 36 ARBs that got their 40 e-titles covering an area of 23.45 hectares of land while in Mountain Province, there were 9 ARBs that got their 9 titles covering an area of 11.87 hectares of agricultural lands in the province.
