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Group 2 PD705
Group 2 PD705
PRESIDENTIAL
DECREE NO. 705
MAY 19, 1975
Revised Forestry Code of the
Philippines
REVISING PRESIDENTIAL DECREE NO. 389
The urgent need for proper classification, management,
and utilization of public domain lands to meet population
demands requires reassessing the multiple uses of forest
lands. Emphasis should not only be on utilization but also
on protecting, rehabilitating, and developing forest lands
to ensure their continued productivity. Current laws and
regulations for forest lands are deemed insufficient to
support government programs focused on proper
classification, delimitation, and comprehensive
management of public domain lands.
Section 1. Title of this Code. This decree shall
be known as the "Revised Forestry Code of the
Philippines."
Section 2. Policies. The State hereby adopts the
following policies:
(a) Forest land uses will align with the country's
development, science and technology progress, and
public welfare.
(b) Land classification and survey shall be
systematized and hastened;
(c) Encouraging and streamlining the establishment of
wood-processing plants.
(d) Emphasizing protection, development, and
rehabilitation of forest lands for sustained
productivity.
Section 4. Creation of, and merger of all forestry
agencies into, the Bureau of Forest Development.
Section 5. Jurisdiction of Bureau
Section 6. Director and Assistant Director and their
qualifications.
Section 7. Supervision and Control.
Section 8. Review
Section 9. Rules and Regulations.
Section 10. Creation of Functional Divisions, and
Regional and District Offices.
All positions in the merged agencies are considered
vacant. Present occupants may be appointed in
accordance with a staffing pattern or plan of
organization to be prepared by the Director and
approved by the Department Head. Any appointee who
fails to report for duty in accordance with the
approved plan within thirty (30) days upon receipt of
notification shall be deemed to have declined the
appointment, in which case the position may be filed
by any other qualified applicant.
Section 10. Creation of Functional Divisions, and
Regional and District Offices.
After agency merger, all positions are vacant; existing
occupants may be appointed based on an approved
plan by the Department Head. Failure to report within
30 days allows the position to be filled by another
qualified applicant.
The Department Head, with the Director's
recommendation, can reorganize and appoint
personnel. Temporarily elevated employees receive the
higher salary until replaced.
There will be at least eleven regional offices with forest
districts based on factors like area and workload.
District boundaries should ideally follow natural
watershed boundaries in river-basin management.
Section 11. Manpower Development
Section 12. Performance Evaluation
CHAPTER II
CLASSIFICATION AND
SURVEY
Section 13. System of Land Classification
The Department Head shall study, devise, determine
and prescribe the criteria, guidelines and methods for
the proper and accurate classification and survey of all
lands of the public domain into agricultural, industrial
or commercial, residential, resettlement, mineral,
timber or forest, and grazing lands, and into such other
classes as now or may hereafter be provided by law,
rules and regulations
Section 13. System of Land
Section 14. Existing Pasture
Classification
Leases and Permits in Forest
The Department Head shall study,
Lands. Forest lands which have
devise, determine and prescribe
been the subject of pasture leases
the criteria, guidelines and
and permits shall remain classified
methods for the proper and
as forest lands until classified as
accurate classification and survey
grazing lands under the criteria,
of all lands of the public domain
guidelines and methods of
into agricultural, industrial or
classification to be prescribed by
commercial, residential,
the Department Head: Provided,
resettlement, mineral, timber or
That the administration,
forest, and grazing lands, and into
management and disposition of
such other classes as now or may
grazing lands shall remain under
hereafter be provided by law, rules
the Bureau.
and regulations
Section 15. Topography. No land of the public domain
eighteen per cent (18%) in slope or over shall be
classified as alienable and disposable, nor any forest
land fifty per cent (50%) in slope or over, as grazing
land.
Section 16. Areas needed for forest purposes. The
following lands, even if they are below eighteen per cent
(18%) in slope, are needed for forest purposes, and may
not, therefore, be classified as alienable and disposable
land, to wit:
1. Small areas (less than 250 hectares) not near or
connected to any certified usable land.
2. Isolated rocky patches of at least five (5) hectares
of forest, or those guarding a communal spring.
3. Previously reforested areas.
4. Areas in timbered forest concessions supporting
existing or approved wood processing plants.
5. Ridge tops and plateaus, any size, within or
surrounded by forest lands where headwaters start.
6. Roads in suitable locations.
7. Twenty-meter strips of land along the normal high
waterline of rivers and streams with channels at least
five (5) meters wide.
8. Coastal mangrove or swampland strips, minimum
width of twenty (20) meters, along ocean, lake, and
water body shorelines, and similar strips facing lakes.
9. Spaces required for public purposes like national
parks, historical sites, game refuges, wildlife
sanctuaries, forest stations, and others of public
interest.
10. Areas previously declared by the President as
forest reserves, national parks, game refuges, bird
sanctuaries, national shrines, and historic sites.
Section 18. Reservations in forest
Section 17. Establishment of
lands and off-shore areas. The
boundaries of forest lands. All
President of the Philippines may
boundaries between permanent
establish within any lands of the
forests and alienable and
public domain, forest reserve and
disposable lands shall be clearly
forest reservation for the national
marked and maintained on the
park system, for preservation as
ground, with infrastructure or
critical watersheds, or for any
roads, or concrete monuments at
other purpose, and modify
intervals of not more than five
boundaries of existing ones. The
hundred (500) meters in
Department Head may reserve and
accordance with established
establish any portion of the public
procedures and standards, or any
forest or forest reserve as site or
other visible and practicable signs
experimental forest for use of the
to insure protection of the forest.
Forest Research Institute.
CHAPTER III
UTILIZATION AND
MANAGEMENT
Section 19. Multiple use
Section 20. License agreement, license, lease or
permit.
Section 21. Sustained yield
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Section 22. Silvicultural and harvesting systems. In
any logging operations in production forests within
forest lands, the proper silvicultural and harvesting
systems that will promote optimum sustained yield
shall be practised.
(a) For dipterocarp forest, selective logging shall be
practised.
(b) For pine forest, the seed tree system with planting
when necessary shall be practised.
(c) For other types of forest, the silvicultural and
harvesting system that will be found suitable by
research shall be applied. Meanwhile, a system based
on observation and practices abroad may be adopted
initially.
Any practised system are subject to modification or
changes based on research findings.
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