Why AR Is Important: Social, Political, Economic,
Ecological, Philosophical, and Practical Reasons for COs1
 Gerry Bulatao
Why AR Is Important
 Introduction
 Social Reasons
 Political Reasons
 Economic Reasons
 Philosophical Reasons
 Practical Reasons for COs
The heart of agrarian reform is land tenure
improvement (LTI). Without making the
farmer secure in his hold on the land, we are
just doing community development, former
DAR Secretary Ernie Garilao (1992-1998) used
to say. On the other hand, if the program stops
at LTI, it may mean promoting equality in
poverty. So support service delivery (SSD) is
very important, too.
But these should not be mere gifts to simple
peasants. It is important to engage
communities of farmers in LTI-SSD processes.
That’s why another vital component is social
infrastructure building and strengthening
(SIBS), according to DAR Secretary Butch
Abad (January-April 1990). DAR now refers to
this as social infrastructure and local capability
building (SILCAB). We will use the term
social infrastructure and capability building
(SICB), but included in this will be not only
local efforts or processes geared to empowering
direct beneficiaries of LTI and SSD, but also
our endeavours to generate positive support for
the reform program.
To summarize these concepts, one may use the
following formula:
AR = (LTI + SSD) x (SICB – ROVI).
Here AR stands for agrarian reform; LTI, land
tenure improvement; SSD, support service
delivery; SICB, social infrastructure and
capability building; and ROVI, resistance of
vested interests. Never discount ROVI because
the rear guard action of vested interests like big
landlords, despite the law, can undermine
program implementation. But SICB can
counteract ROVI, with the support of those who
take the law seriously. If SICB is stronger than
ROVI, it has the effect of multiplying the
positive effect of (LTI + SSD) and not just
adding to it.
Introduction: Meaning of AR
AR = (LTI + SSD) x (SICB – ROVI).
AR -- Agrarian Reform;
LTI -- Land Tenure Improvement;
SSD -- Support Service Delivery;
SICB -- Social Infrastructure and
Capability Building;
ROVI -- Resistance of Vested Interests
Social Reasons
Agrarian issues are great as stimuli for
organizing farmers or farm workers. There are
many examples of strong organizations
constructed around agrarian reform.
Since "having" may enhance "being," the
Why Agrarian Reform Is Important / 1
landowning farmer's self-esteem may rise,
especially if he participates in the process of
securing his own land tenure. This may remove
a possible obstacle to his fuller participation in
community development.
Social Reasons
 “Having” may enhance “being.”
 Landowning farmer’s self-esteem
rises, especially if he has
participated in the process of
making his land tenure secure.
 This may remove a possible
obstacle to fuller participation in
community development.
Political Reasons
LTI may break up the hold of a big landowner
on a block of voters dependent on him. This
hastens the levelling of the political playing
field.
Without agrarian security, there can be no
enduring peace in the countryside.
LTI may lead to greater public participation of
former tenants and farmworkers in political
activities, increasing their stake in democratic
society and making it more likely that they will
defend it.
If LTI is related purposively to community
development and participatory local
governance, it would deepen democracy and
allow the countryside to move beyond ballot
box democracy. It would combine
representative with participatory democracy.
Political Reasons
 AR may help level the electoral
playing field.
 No enduring rural peace without
AR.
 AR may lead to greater people’s
participation in political processes.
 AR coupled with community-driven
development and participatory local
governance would deepen
democracy.
Economic Reasons
The lack of tenurial security may prevent the
farmer from adopting new agricultural
technology taught him as it may still be the
landowner who decides what to plant and when.
This may make it unwise to invest in
agricultural extension for small farmers.
The incentive to produce more and to invest
more time and money to make his land more
productive will be much lower if the farmer
does not control the resource.
Hence, LTI may help to develop the farmer as a
producer and, as his income rises, as a
consumer as well.
When coupled with SSD and SIBS, LTI is
expected to lead to an improved quality of rural
life and the development of caring
communities, thus reducing migration to urban
centers or other countries.
Why Agrarian Reform Is Important / 2
 Economic Reasons (1)
 Lack of tenurial security impedes
adoption of new agri technology, as
it is the non-cultivating landowner
who decides what and when to
plant.
 It may be unwise to invest in
agricultural extension for small
farmers before LTI.
 Without secure tenure, farmers
have inadequate incentive to invest
more time and money.
 LTI helps develop farmers as
producers and consumers.
It may also be good for the landowner because
it frees capital tied up with land for more
productive and profitable investments.
It is good for the economy as a whole. Greater
demand for goods and services by farmers now
better off combined with more capital for
productive enterprises stimulates further
economic growth. Growth is necessary to make
or keep a society equitable--and no one wants a
society where people are equally poor--but it is
likewise true that lack of equity retards growth
because it limits people's purchasing power.
LTI, however, may be bad for land speculators,
i.e., people who treat land simply as a
commodity subject solely to the rules of the
marketplace and want to hold on to it regardless
of whether it produces anything or not, because
they think that the value of the land will rise so
that they can then sell it at a high price and
make a huge profit.
Economic Reasons (2)
 Properly designed and implemented,
AR would improve quality of rural
life and reduce migration to urban
centers and other countries.
 It may benefit landowners because it
frees up capital tied to land for more
productive and profitable
investments.
 It is good for the economy as a
whole. Greater demand for goods
and services by farmers now better
off combined with more capital for
productive enterprises stimulates
further economic growth.
The trouble with land speculation is that the
value of the land often rises not primarily on
account of the owner's work or investments but
due to increase in population -- in other words,
because of relative land scarcity: growing
demand, diminishing supply -- or due to
Economic Reasons (3)
Growth is necessary to make or keep a
society equitable, just as lack of equity
retards growth.
AR may be bad for land speculators,
people who treat land as a commodity
subject solely to the rules of the
marketplace.
But land values are not due to
speculators but to growth of demand
and improvements in infrastructure.
So windfall profits should be taxed
heavily.
Why Agrarian Reform Is Important / 3
government's improvement of transportation
and communication infrastructure, which in
turn may tempt owners to convert farm land to
urban commercial, industrial, or residential
purposes. If the value of land increases
dramatically due to such reasons, it is morally
right for the government in representation of
society to impose very high taxes on windfall
profits.
unless they have secure access and control of
land -- in other words, some kind of title or
certificate of stewardship.
Ecological Reasons
 Interlacing farms, forests, and
factories is good for the
environment.

Ecological Reasons  Government must preserve the

most fertile land, especially when it
Modern human settlements theory would has invested in irrigation. The best
interlace farms, forests, and factories as the best way to achieve this is to ensure
way to take care of the environment. owner-cultivatorship and
reservation of the land for farming.
This means that government should preserve
the most fertile agricultural land for farming,  Will government or investors spend
especially when it has made a large investment more to set up infra in hilly or stony
in installing irrigation facilities. areas so that industrial and
residential sites could locate there?
The best way to do this is by giving ownership
to the cultivators of the soil and declaring such  Ignoring AR may have adverse
land an "integrated protected area" reserved for consequence for agri development
agricultural use.
and ecological nurturance.
However, this also presumes more political will
than the present government may have and
Philosophical Reasons
readiness to spend more for setting up
communications and transportation
Land is a free gift of nature or a special creation
infrastructure in hilly and stony areas
of Almighty God from which springs life. No
marginally useful for farming -- or enticing
one may own land in the sense of an absolute
investors to spend for this -- so that more
lord so that he or she may do with the land as
industrial and residential areas would be located
he or she pleases.
on such hillsides.
According to the Comprehensive Agrarian
Not taking LTI seriously may have adverse
Reform Law of 1988, "...land has a social
consequences for agricultural development and
function and land ownership has a social
ecological nurturance. If the hills in one
responsibility" (RA 6657, Section 2, Paragraph
barangay remain bald, erosion will continue
10).
and water table levels will decline. These hills
will probably not be reforested if owned by
In a sense, only the Divine Lord owns land
someone who resides, say, in Metro Manila.
absolutely and all human landowners are
Farmers are unlikely to plant trees or use
merely stewards.
sloping agricultural land technology (SALT)

Why Agrarian Reform Is Important / 4

People have no right to misuse, abuse, or not
use land.
Like responsible stewards, human owners of
agricultural land must make it productive while
ensuring that the next generation will inherit it
with its fertility intact.
Philosophical Reasons (1)
 Land is a free gift of nature or a
special creation of Almighty God
from which springs life.
 No person may own land like an
absolute lord to do with the land as
he or she pleases. The Divine Lord
alone owns land absolutely and all
human landowners are merely
stewards.
 CARL of 1988 declares that “land
has a social function and land
ownership has a social
responsibility.” (RA 6657, Section 2,
Paragraph 10).
 People have no right to misuse,
abuse or not use land.
 Responsible stewards must make
land productive while ensuring that
the next generation will inherit it
with its fertility intact.
The persons with the best right to own land are
those who give the most value to the land due
to their labor and those who most need to own
the land for social, economic, ecological, or
political reasons.
Another way of saying this is that LTI is based
on the land-to-the-tiller principle.
Still another formulation is the following which
recognizes a right to ownership conferred
implicitly by work on the land as well as by
need for ownership: "The State
shall...undertake an agrarian reform program
founded on the right of farmers and regular
farmworkers, who are landless, to own directly
or collectively the lands they till...." (1987
Constitution, Article XIII, Section 4).
Philosophical Reasons (2)
 Persons who give the most value to
land due to their labor and who
most need to own the land for
various reasons have the strongest
moral right to own.
 Another way of saying this: LTI is
based on the land-to-the-tiller
principle.
 A third formulation: “The State shall
…undertake an agrarian reform
program founded on the right of
farmers and regular farmworkers,
who are landless, to own directly or
collectively the lands they till….”
(1987 Constitution, Article XIII,
Section 4)
Practical Reasons
for Community Organizers
Why is LTI important to a community
organizer (CO)? Taking up LTI as an issue
around which to mobilize people is one of the
best ways to initiate action in a barangay. It is
also a good way to ensure broad participation of
the rural community so that benefits are not
limited to a few.
Why Agrarian Reform Is Important / 5
Neglecting LTI may have the effect of leaving
out a large number of people in the CO's
assigned barangay.
It may also result in the domination of the
barangay's development process by individuals
who stand to lose something when LTI is
implemented, and thus oppose it when it is
introduced, making permanent a situation
where a large segment of the barangay
population may be unable to fully participate in
and benefit from the development process.
Even if the first issues for mobilizing barangay
folk are related to basic services and
infrastructure -- which more commonly are
confronted prior to land issues -- it is necessary
that the initial social investigation immediately
takes into account the land tenure situation and
agrarian issues, lest action and opportunities for
leadership be restricted to those whose interests
may conflict with the land-to-the-tiller
principle.
Practical Reasons for COs
 Mobilization around LTI issues
ensures broader participation.
Neglecting LTI may result in
excluding many households.
 Individuals who stand to lose
something when LTI is implemented
may dominate the barangay’s
development process and oppose
LTI. Poor farmers may be unable to
participate in community processes
and benefit from development.
 Basic services and infra lack may
be the initial issues for mobilizing.
But social investigation must
discover early who farms what but
doesn’t own and who owns what
but doesn’t farm, lest landless
farmers be excluded from action
and opportunities for leadership
formation.

Excerpts from "Agrarian Reform: Democracy at Work"

by President Fidel V. Ramos, 15 June 1995*
The work in the next three years...will depend on how much we can strengthen the economic capacity
and the political will of government to push the program... on how we can sustain the continued support
of the farmers for the program and their readiness to take advantage of CARP's windows of
opportunity... on encouraging more cooperation from some landowners to the extent that they will
transform their remaining resistance into collaboration in the democratization of landownership.

My appeal then, on the seventh year of the program, is for all of us to get our acts together in the service
of agrarian reform. Let us finish the job.

To the landowners, I invite you to join us as co-creators of rural prosperity. I fully understand that land
ownership is a very emotional, frequently volatile, issue. But the future of our country lies in a more just
sharing of our productive resources. The time has come to shift capital from land to industry, especially
agro-industry.
I call on . . . (government) leaders who (obtained) the people's mandate during the 8 May elections, to be
with us in this bold trek to a brighter future . . . . For the legislative branch, I ask you to help us with the

Why Agrarian Reform Is Important / 6

vital enabling legislation to strengthen agrarian reform. No more exemptions! Pass only those bills that
keep our agrarian reform program strong and viable.

For the non-government organizations and the people's organizations, I urge you to continue working
with us, particularly at the grassroots communities. As we all know, there are not yet enough organized
farmers groups in the country. This is a weakness which we can together effectively solve.

For the people's organizations, I ask not only that you stay on the land but (that you) make it extremely
productive and efficient. In this way, you will be adding even more value to your already considerable
contribution to the nation's economy.

My call then is for us to continue trusting each other -- and continue working together.

* President Fidel V. Ramos, "Agrarian Reform: Democracy at Work," Seventh CARL Anniversary
Celebration, Malacañang, Manila, 15 June 1995, included as an appendix in the 05-06 June 1995
ARRD National Consultation Proceedings, p. 142

FN: AR Papers-Why AR Is Important-Txt & Slds-070610

1
The bulk of this article comes from KAISAHAN Occasional Paper No. 95-04, Notes on CO and LTI in a SIAD Project, by
Gerry Bulatao, then KAISAHAN Executive Director, October 1995.

Why Agrarian Reform Is Important / 7