FARMERS in the Philippines continue to criticize the national government for its “dismal” pace in acquiring private agricultural lands and completing land distribution for agrarian reform beneficiaries (ARBs), 36 years after the enactment of the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP) and other land reform laws.
In Quezon City, hundreds of farmers from the Task Force Mapalad (TFM) and other groups, some traveling from Palawan, Rizal, and Batangas provinces, began a protest camp outside the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) headquarters on Monday, June 10, 2024. They demanded President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. expedite land distribution.
Similarly, over 500 farmers from the ECJ CLOA Holders and Farmworkers Association (Echafawa) and the Kilusan para sa Repormang Agraryo at Katarungang Panlipunan (Katarungan) gathered at the DAR provincial office in Negros Occidental South to mark CARP’s 36th anniversary and highlight ongoing struggles and demands. They emphasized the “discrepancies between the program’s goals and the reality experienced by farmers.”
“Land distribution is the main feature of redistributive land reform because it signifies the actual transfer of power from big landlords or corporations to the actual tillers,” said Danny Carranza, Katarungan’s secretary-general, in an interview on Tuesday, June 11. “This empowers tillers to decide what, when, and how to produce, and to benefit directly from their labor.”
Carranza attributed the delay in land distribution to “resistance to land reform by powerful actors and the government’s lack of political will.” He criticized provisions like the Stock Distribution Option and the Joint Venture Agreement, which allowed landlords to evade agrarian reform.
In a separate interview, Rico Cajife, a former farmer organizer in Eastern Visayas, underscored the importance of land distribution for farmers’ dignity and livelihood. “The poor will be able to have a livelihood and ensure their food security,” he said, echoing Carranza’s sentiments about the influence of big landlords and oligarchs.
Dhon Daganasol, a Katarungan farmer leader from Carigara, Leyte, stressed the necessity of land distribution for farmers’ security. “If their land is not acquired and titled to them, there is a chance it will be repossessed by the original owner,” said Daganasol, who has been tilling his land since the late 1980s. While his family successfully acquired their farmland through the government’s program, he expressed sympathy for other farmers still awaiting ownership.
In five areas in Leyte province—Alangalang, Barugo, Carigara, San Miguel, and Ormoc City—approximately 10,000 hectares of land remain undistributed, according to Daganasol.
However, DAR-Eastern Visayas regional information officer Jose Alsmith Soria stated that land distribution for ARBs is ongoing. With the “renewed commitment” of Marcos Jr., Soria said they aim to complete land title distribution before the president’s term ends on June 30, 2028. “We have about 29,000 hectares of land for distribution, with about 11,000 more agrarian reform beneficiaries to benefit in the Eastern Visayas region,” Soria told Catholic news site UCA News.
As of June 2022, TFM reported that 173,340 hectares of land nationwide still need to be distributed. TFM’s figures show that 30,936 hectares of CARP-covered lands remain undistributed in Negros Occidental, the largest tract of CARP land in the country.
Citing a DAR report, TFM noted that only 12,254.089 hectares were distributed to 9,379 agrarian reform beneficiaries in 2023, one of the lowest yearly records since CARP’s enactment. TFM urged the Marcos administration to demonstrate political will and fully implement agrarian reform nationwide. According to the farmer groups, the president must remain “consistent with his pledge to break the chains that bind farmers to the soil.”
By Ronald O. Reyes
