Land reform and changes in land ownership concentration: evidence from rice-growing villages in the Philippines | Land Portal

Informations sur la ressource

Date of publication: 
janvier 2006
Resource Language: 
ISBN / Resource ID: 
eldis:A75340

Land reform has been the main policy response of government to correct the sharp inequalities in the distribution of land ownership in the Philippines. The historical records show that the process of disposal of State lands has heavily favored households with economic and political power. These households had undue advantage over the common populace in acquiring property rights through the Spanish system of royal grants and the American system of land cadastre. The result has been the ownership of big landholdings by few families and the rise of haciendas or family estates comprising several hundreds and thousands of hectares.

This paper examines the effect of land reform and land transfer actions of farmer beneficiaries on land ownership concentration. A case study of two rice-growing villages was used to track down ownership changes over a period of time. Land reform has succeeded in the break up of huge estates in rice-growing villages but has not effectively improved land ownership concentration due to evasions tactics of landlords who have retained a significant portion of lands to the family through land schemes that are apparently legitimate under the land reform laws. Land transfer actions of farmer beneficiaries have not necessarily worsen the current land ownership concentration but in the absence of progressive land tax, these actions can lead to widening land concentration.

Auteurs et éditeurs

Author(s), editor(s), contributor(s): 

M. Ballesteros
A. dela Cruz

Publisher(s): 

Fournisseur de données

eldis (ELDIS)

Eldis is an online information service providing free access to relevant, up-to-date and diverse research on international development issues. The database includes over 40,000 summaries and provides free links to full-text research and policy documents from over 8,000 publishers. Each document is selected by members of our editorial team.


Concentration géographique

Partagez cette page