DAR steps up CARP in Region I

Agrarian Reform Secretary Roberto Pagdanganan said he is very optimistic about meeting the government’s land distribution target of about 110,000 hectares this year as he noted the stepped-up implementation of the comprehensive agrarian reform (CARP) in Region I, or the Ilocos Region.

Pagdanganan said that from January to August this year, DAR Region I had acquired and distributed over 1,779 hectares of agricultural lands to 2,669 farmer-beneficiaries. The accomplishment represents 95 percent of the region’s land distribution target of 1,877 hectares for 2003.

"This is very encouraging. It indicates that the field offices of the Department of Agrarian Reform are working hard to make good the government’s commitment to make agrarian reform a true instrument to democratize land ownership and achieve rural growth," Pagdanganan said.

Reports from DAR Region I show that as of the end of August, 696.2 hectares were distributed in La Union, 684.4 hectares in Ilocos Norte, 329.5 hectares in pangasinan, and 69.2 hectares in Ilocos Sur.

This brought to 120, 445 hectares the total area of agricultural lands already distributed in the Ilocos Region, benefiting 111,805 farmers and farm workers. In addition, 113,530 hectares were subjected to leasehold agreements, benefiting 158,457 farmers.

Leasehold is a non-land transfer scheme in areas where agricultural lands are already exempted from distribution, such as landholdings retained by landowners. The leasehold agreement aims to protect the tenure of tenants through contract with the landowner.

Pagdanganan said that aside from land distribution, DAR Region I had also stepped up the delivery of support services to make the farmers more productive and to make their enterprises more profitable.

To date, DAR Region I had launched 126 agrarian communities (ARCs) covering 577 barangays and 63,243 agrarian reform beneficiaries (ARBs). Of these ARCs, 46 are covered by foreign-assisted projects.

Among DAR’s foreign-assisted projects in Region I are the Agrarian Reform Communities Development Project (ARCDP), support by the World Bank, which covers 12 ARCs; the Agrarian Reform Infrastructure Support Project (ARISP), supported by the Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC), which covers 17 ARCs, and the Agrarian Reform Communities Project (ARCP), supported by the Asian Development Bank (ADB), which covers another 17 ARCs.

Among the infrastructures already provided by these foreign-assisted projects to the ARCs are 995 farm-to-market roads witht total length of 1,630 kilometers, 181 bridges with total length of 7,383 linear meters, 367 communal irrigation facilities servicing 24,550 hectares and benefiting 26,449 ARBs, and2,120 post-harvest facilities.