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Must Know If You Are Planning to Own Agricultural Land in the Philippines

If you are planning to buy an agricultural land especially riceland in the Philippines, here are the things that you have to watch out for:

1. Know if the land is irrigated or not.

    If it is irrigated:

    a. Know if the irrigation fees has been paid by the seller. Irrigation system is considered a permanent improvement in the land. Therefore, it is the owner who should pay for the fees. This means that absent agreement between the landowner and tenant, the obligation to pay for the irrigation fees belongs to the owner;
    b. It is non-negotiable for conversion or it is prohibited from being turned from agricultural use to some other use, say, from agricultural to commercial;
    c.   It produces more compared to rain-fed riceland;

2.   Know if it is tenanted. This is important because tenants of an agricultural land under leasehold contract is protected under the law, specifically RA 3844. They have a security of tenure which will not be affected despite changes in the personality of the landowner. You cannot stop a tenant from cultivating the land on the ground that you will be personally cultivating it or have it cultivated by someone of your own choosing. The best thing to do is to talk it out with the tenant or ask the intervention of the concerned government agency. 

Forcibly ousting a tenant out will have dire consequences especially if the government intervenes and most probably, they will through the Department of Agrarian Reform. This holds true for tenant with or without a contract as long as implied tenancy is clearly established by evidence.

3.   Check if the title is an Emancipation Patent or Certificate of Land Ownership Award. These two kinds of title were issued under a government program to farmer-beneficiaries. It has attached conditions such as prohibition to transfer subject land for a period of ten years or that it is prohibited to be sold or owned by a corporation due to attached condition that personal cultivation is required (Panlilio vs Dizon, GR No. 148777, October 18, 2007).



Moreover, the said titles have more stringent requirements compared to regularly issued title like those issued under the Torrens system.

4.   That you and/or your spouse cannot own more than five hectares of agricultural land in the Philippines. If you exceed five hectares, the transaction is disallowed or deemed contrary to law or the excess may be covered by concerned government agency under an existing government program to distribute land to the landless.


Buying property in the Philippines requires due diligence. One should examine the contents of the title and the annotations contained in it. It is also highly recommended to visit the actual site for pragmatic reasons. 


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