DAVAO CITY, Philippines -Three years into President Ferdinand ‘Bongbong’ Marcos Jr.’s administration, landlessness remains a pressing concern for Filipino farmers despite its agrarian reform initiatives.
The Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP), a national organization of farmers campaigning for agrarian reform, stated that government programs, such as the 2020 Support to Parcelization of Lands for Individual Titling (SPLIT), and the New Agrarian Emancipation Act (NAEA), are merely tokenistic that failed to bring about alleviation for farmers.
Marcos Jr. held the post of the Department of Agriculture at the start of his presidency in June 2022 and appointed Francisco Tiu Laurel Jr., a fishing tycoon, over a year later in November 2023.
The organization revealed data on the SPLIT project that only 12 per cent of its targets have been covered as of 2025, despite the program nearing its end in 2027.
Additionally, out of the 195,000 distributed Certificates of Land Ownership Award (CLOAs) by the Department of Agrarian Reform, there are 132,000 or above two-thirds that were simply parcelized titles.
KMP said this suggests that the project did not involve actual land redistribution but instead divided existing collective CLOAs.
According to KMP, a staggering 72%, or seven out of ten farmers in the country are landless, with only 28% of farm parcels fully owned by the tillers. They also noted that the benefits of parcelization are minimal since CLOA recipient farmers still operate on smaller land areas compared to large agribusiness corporations.
Leo Fuentes, regional coordinator of Magsasaka at Siyentipiko para sa Pag-unlad ng Agrikultura (MASIPAG) Mindanao, validates the data from KMP based on their survey of the agrarian situation in Mindanao. He emphasized how the meager incomes of farmers are worsened by landlessness, forcing them to allocate a significant portion of their profits to pay for land rentals.
“For landless farmers, borrowing land often involves arrangements like product sharing on the harvest or fixed land rental payments,” explained Fuentes. He added that land rental becomes a direct cost or expense for farmers, often leading to negative income and resulting in debt.
Another agrarian reform program, the NAEA, intended to cancel debts of farmers, drew skepticism from KMP as it claims that many debts the program cancelled were already considered uncollectible or excessive.
The group said that the release of Certificates of Condonation of Release of Mortgage (COCROMs), intended to secure land rights of farmers, has been ineffective.
KMP said recipients continue to struggle with “flawed and contested” CLOAs or land titles, and only 14% of the targeted beneficiaries have received such certificates, indicating the slow progress of the program.
The group also questioned the timing of the distribution of such certificates which happens as the State of the Nation Address of Marcos Jr. approaches every July.
KMP said the true state of farmers are facing “unresolved agrarian cases, widespread land-use conversions, and the revocation of previously awarded land continue” that erode the rights of farmers.
The group raised concerns that with the lack of ownership and displacement, they suspect the SPLIT and NAEA projects may facilitate the commercialization of agrarian lands protected under the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP).
“These programs could open up land for consolidation by landlords, agribusinesses, real estate developers, and foreign investors, which would further displace small farmers and agrarian reform beneficiaries,” the farmers group said.
KMP Chairperson Danilo Ramos described PBBM’s administration as “three years of service that worsened landlessness, starvation, and violations” and referred to the President as a “pest to the farmers.”(davaotoday.com)
