ON CONVERSION

Ros vs. DAR, GR 132477, Aug. 31, 2005 468 SCRA 471

Fact: Petitioners are the owners/developers of several parcels of land located in Arpili, Balamban,
Cebu. By virtue of Municipal Ordinance No. 101 passed by the Municipal Council, these lands were
reclassified as industrial lands. On 03 April 1995, the Provincial Board of Cebu approved Balamban’s land
use plan and adopted en toto Balamban’s Municipal Ordinance No. 101 with the passage of Resolution
No. 836-95 and Provincial Ordinance No. 95-8, respectively. As part of their preparation for the
development of the subject lands as an industrial park, petitioners secured all the necessary permits and
appropriate government certifications. Despite these permits and certifications, petitioner received a
letter from Director of the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) Regional Office for Region 7, informing
him that the DAR was disallowing the conversion of the subject lands for industrial use and directed him
to cease and desist from further developments on the land to avoid the incurrence of civil and criminal
liabilities. Petitioners were thus constrained to file with the Regional Trial Court (RTC) of Toledo City for
Injunction with Application for Temporary Restraining Order and a Writ of Preliminary Injunction the RTC,
ruling that it is the DAR which has jurisdiction, dismissed the Complaint for lack of jurisdiction. At the Court
of Appeals, the public respondents were ordered to file their Comments on the petition. Two sets of
comments from the public respondents, one from the Department of Agrarian Reform Provincial Office
and another from the Office of the Solicitor General, were submitted, to which petitioners filed their
Consolidated Reply. the Court of Appeals rendered a decision affirming the Order of Dismissal issued by
the RTC. A motion for reconsideration filed by the petitioners was denied in a resolution dated 30 January
1998.

Issue: Whether the reclassification of the subject lands to industrial use by LGU pursuant to its authority
has the effect of taking such lands out of the coverage of the CARL and beyond the jurisdiction of the DAR?

Held: No, after the passages of Republic Act No. 6657 (CARP), agricultural lands, though reclassified,
have to go through the process of conversion. jurisdiction over which is vested in the DAR. However,
agricultural lands already reclassified before the effectivity of Rep. Act No. 6657 are exempted from
conversion. The agricultural lands must go through the required process of conversion despite of having
undergone reclassification. In the current case, there is no final order of conversion. The subject
landholding was merely reclassified. Conversion is different from reclassification. Conversion is the act of
changing the current use of a piece of agricultural land into some other use as approved by the
Department of Agrarian Reform. Reclassification, on the other hand, is the act of specifying how
agricultural lands shall be utilized for non-agricultural uses such as residential, industrial, and commercial,
as embodied in the land use plan, subject to the requirements and procedure for land use conversion.
Accordingly, a mere reclassification of agricultural land does not automatically allow a landowner to
change its use and thus cause the ejectment of the tenants. He has to undergo the process of conversion
before he is permitted to use the agricultural land for other purposes.
CASE DIGEST: CHAMBER OF REAL ESTATE AND BUILDERS ASSOCIATIONS, INC. (CREBA) v. THE
SECRETARY OF AGRARIAN REFORM

FACTS: Oct 1997 Sec of DAR issued DAR A.O. entitled Omnibus Rules and Procedures Governing
Conversion of Agricultural Lands to Non Agricultural Uses. The said AO embraced all private agricultural
lands regardless of tenurial arrangement and commodity produced and all untitled agricultural lands and
agricultural lands reclassified by LGU into non-agricultural uses after 15 June 1988. March 1999, Sec DAR
issued Revised Rules and Regulations on Conversion of Agricultural Lands to Non AgriculturalUses, it
covers the following: (1) those to be converted to residential, commercial, industrial, institutional and
other non-agricultural purposes; (2) those to be devoted to another type of agricultural activity such as
livestock, poultry, and fishpond ─ the effect of which is to exempt the land from the Comprehensive
Agrarian Reform Program (CARP) coverage; (3) those to be converted to non-agricultural use other than
that previously authorized; and (4) those reclassified to residential, commercial, industrial, or other non-
agricultural uses on or after the effectivity of Republic Act No. 6657 on 15 June 1988 pursuant to Section
20 of Republic Act No. 7160 and other pertinent laws and regulations, and are to be converted to such
uses. The 2 earlier AOs was further amended by an AO issued Feb 2002 - 2002 Comprehensive Rules on
Land Use Conversion; covers all applications for conversion from agricultural to non-agricultural uses or
to another agricultural use.

The AO was amended again in 2007 to include provisions particularly addressing land conversion in time
of exigencies and calamities. To address the conversion to lands to non agricultural, Sec of DAR suspended
processing and approval of land conversion through DAR Memo 88. CREBA claims that there is a slowdown
of housing projects because of such stoppage

ISSUES: Is DAR's AO unconstitutional?

HELD: RA 6657 and 8435 defines agricultural land as lands devoted to or suitable for the cultivation of the
soil, planting of crops, growing of fruit trees, raising of livestock, poultry or fish, including the harvesting
of such farm products, and other farm activities and practices performed by a farmer in conjunction with
such farming operations done by a person whether natural or juridical, and not classified by the law as
mineral, forest, residential, commercial or industrial land. However, he issued an AO included in this
definition - lands not reclassified as residential, commercial, industrial or other non-agricultural uses
before 15 June 1988. In effect, lands reclassified from agricultural to residential, commercial, industrial,
or other non-agricultural uses after 15 June 1988 are considered to be agricultural lands for purposes of
conversion, redistribution, or otherwise. This is violation of RA 6657 because there is nothing in Section
65 of Republic Act No. 6657 or in any other provision of law that confers to the DAR the jurisdiction or
authority to require that non-awarded lands or reclassified lands be submitted to its conversion authority.
Also, it violates Section 20 of Republic Act No. 7160, because it was not provided therein that
reclassification by LGUs shall be subject to conversion procedures or requirements, or that the DARs
approval or clearance must be secured to effect reclassification. The said Section 2.19 of DAR AO No. 01-
02, as amended, also contravenes the constitutional mandate on local autonomy under Section 25, Article
II and Section 2, Article X of the 1987 Philippine Constitution. There is deprivation of liberty and property
without due process of law because under DAR AO No. 01-02, as amended, lands that are not within DARs
jurisdiction are unjustly, arbitrarily and oppressively prohibited or restricted from legitimate use on pain
of administrative and criminal penalties. More so, there is discrimination and violation of the equal
protection clause of the Constitution because the aforesaid administrative order is patently biased in favor
of the peasantry at the expense of all other sectors of society. DISMISSED.

G.R. No. 131457 Case Digest

G.R. No. 131457, August 19, 1999

Hon. Carlos Fortich (Governor), Hon. Rey Baula (Mayor, Sumilao), NQSR Management and Development
Corp.

vs Hon. Renato C. Corona, Deputy Exec. Sec., Hon. Ernesto Garilao, Sec. DAR

Ponente: Ynares-Santiago

Facts:

Respondents and intervenors pray that this case be referred to SC En Banc. A careful reading however,
reveals the intention of the framers to draw a distinction between cases, "decided" referring to cases and
"resolved" referring to matters, applying the rule of reddendo singula singulis. (referring each to each)

The issue presented by the respondents is whether the power of the LGU to reclassify lands is subject to
the approval of the CAR is no longer novel, this having decided in Camarines Sur vs CA case that the LGU
need not obtain the approval of the DAR to convert or reclassify lands from agricultural to non-agricultural
use.

Intervenors insist that they are real parties in interest inasmuch as they have already been issued
certificates of land ownership award, or CLOAs, and that while they are seasonal farm workers at the
plantation, they have been identified by the DAR as qualified beneficiaries of the property.

Ruling:
Intervenors, who are admittedly not regular but seasonal farm workers, have no legal or actual and
substantive interest over the subject land inasmuch as they have no right to own the land. Rather, their
right is limited only to a just share of the fruits of the land.

Tangub vs. CA, 191 SCRA 885, Dec. 3, 1990 UDK No. 9864 : December 3, 1990

Fact: Petitioner filed with the Regional Trial Court of Lanao del Norte in March, 1988, “an agrarian case
for damages by reason of the(ir) unlawful dispossession . . .was tenants from the landholding” owned by
the Spouses Domingo and Eugenia Martil. Several persons were also impleaded as defendants, including
the Philippine National Bank, it being alleged by the plaintiff spouses that said bank, holder of a mortgage
on the land involved, had caused foreclosure thereof, resulting in the acquisition of the property by the
bank as the highest bidder at the foreclosure sale, and in the sale by the latter, sometime later, of portions
of the land to the other persons named as its co-defendants (all employees of the National Steel
Corporation), and it being prayed that mortgage and the transactions thereafter made in relation thereto
be annulled and voided. In an Order rendered on August 24, 1988, respondent Judge Felipe G. Javier, Jr.
dismissed the complaint. He opined that by virtue of Executive Order No. 229 “providing the mechanisms
for the implementation of the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program approved on July 24, 1987” —
Executive No. 129-A approved on July 26, 1987, as well as the Rules of the Adjudication Board of the
Department of Agrarian Reform, jurisdiction of the Regional Trial Court over agrarian cases had been
transferred to the Department of Agrarian Reform.:

Issue: Where the RTC erred in dismissing the Agrarian case for Lack of Jurisdiction

Held: The RTC correctly dissmissed the case as the jurisdiction over the aggrarian case was already
transferred to the DAR. the said case also doesn’t involved “special jurisdiction” of said Trial Court acting
as a Special Agrarian Court, it clearly came within the exclusive original jurisdiction of the Department of
Agrarian Reform, or more particularly, the Agrarian Reform Adjudication Board, established precisely to
wield the adjudicatory powers of the Department. Section 17 of Executive Order No. 229 sets out the
scope of the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program vested the Department of Agrarian Reform with
“quasi-judicial powers to determine and adjudicate agrarian reform matters and granted it “jurisdiction
over all matters involving implementation of agrarian reform, except those falling under the exclusive
original jurisdiction of the DENR and the Department of Agriculture [DA], as well as “powers to punish for
contempt and to issue subpoena, subpoena duces tecum and writs to enforce its orders or decisions.

Sta. Rosa vs. CA, GR 112526, Oct. 12, 2001 121 SCRA 254

Facts: Petitioner was the registered owner of two parcels of land, MARO issued a notice of coverage to
petitioner and invited its officials or representatives to a conference. During the meeting It was the
consensus and recommendation of the assembly that the landholding of SRRDC be placed under
compulsory acquisition. Petitioner filed a “Protest and Objection” to the compulsory acquisition of the
property. Secretary of Agrarian Reform sent two notices of acquisition to petitioner. Secretary of Agrarian
Reform sent two 2 notices of acquisition to petitioner, stating that petitioner’s landholdings covered by
TCT Nos. 81949 and 84891, containing an area of 188.2858 and 58.5800 hectares, valued at P4,417,735.65
and P1,220,229.93, respectively, had been placed under the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program.
petitioner SRRDC in two letters 2 separately addressed to Secretary Florencio B. Abad and the Director,
Bureau of Land Acquisition and Distribution, sent its formal protest, protesting not only the amount of
compensation offered by DAR for the property but also the two (2) notices of acquisition. Secretary Abad
referred the case to the DARAB for summary proceedings to determine just compensation. Petitioner sent
a letter to the Land Bank of the Philippines stating that its property under the aforesaid land titles were
exempt from CARP coverage because they had been classified as watershed area and were the subject of
a pending petition for land conversion. Office of the Secretary, DAR, through the Undersecretary for
Operations (Assistant Secretary for Luzon Operations) and the Regional Director of Region IV, submitted
a report answering the two issues raised. According to them, firstly, by virtue of the issuance of the notice
of coverage on August 11, 1989, and notice of acquisition on December 12, 1989, the property is covered
under compulsory acquisition. Secondly, Administrative Order No. 1, Series of 1990, Section IV D also
supports the DAR position on the coverage of the said property. During the consideration of the case by
the Board, there was no pending petition for land conversion specifically concerning the parcels of land
in question. The Board sent a notice of hearing to all the parties interested, setting the hearing for the
administrative valuation of the subject parcels of land. However, SRRDC submitted a petition to the Board
for the latter to resolve SRRDC’s petition for exemption from CARP coverage before any administrative
valuation of their landholding could be had by the Board. The initial DARAB hearing of the case was held
and subsequently, different dates of hearing were set without objection from counsel of SRRDC.

Issue: Whether the respondents complied with the procedural requirement of the Comprehensive
Agrarian Reform Law?

Held: No, we held that failed to comply with the requirements of the CARP Law. for its part, conditions
the transfer of possession and ownership of the land to the government on receipt of the landowner of
the corresponding payment or the deposit by the DAR of the compensation in cash or LBP bonds with an
accessible bank. Until then, title also remains with the landowner. No outright change of ownership is
contemplated either. DAR has executed the taking of the property in question. However, payment of just
compensation was not in accordance with the procedural requirement. The law required payment in cash
or LBP bonds, not by trust account as was done by DAR.