The Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) on Thursday launched the P24.625 billion World Bank-funded Support to Parcelization of Lands for Individual Titling (SPLIT) project, which aims to improve land tenure security and stabilize property rights of 1,140,735 agrarian reform beneficiaries (ARBs) nationwide.
DAR Secretary John Castriciones said the project aims to fast track land subdivision/parcelization of collective certificates of land ownership awards (CCLOAs) and eventually issue individual land titles to ARBs who were previously awarded with lands and collective CLOAs under the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP).
"Many farmers who were granted lands under the country’s agrarian reform program have been waiting for individual land titles. Some have even waited for decades," he said.
Castriciones said the SPLIT project is funded by the World Bank, with a total project cost of P24.625 billion, comprising 78 percent loan proceeds amounting to P19.240 billion and 22 percent Government of the Philippines (GOP) counterpart amounting to P5.385 billion.
He explained that the project will be implemented by DAR in 78 provinces in 15 regional offices, covering a total area of 1.368 million hectares, starting this year until 2024.
SPLIT project has three components: parcelization of collective CLOAs; capability building and technical assistance; and project management, monitoring and evaluation.
"During the first year of SPLIT project implementation, initial activities will include inventory of CCLOA, validation, survey of 15,338 hectares, registration and titling of 29,660 CLOAs which is equivalent to 35,592 hectares. Enhanced and improved parcelization procedures and new survey techniques to generate individual titles will be tested in priority regions," Castriciones said.
The SPLIT Project will be implemented by DAR in partnership with the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, Land Registration Authority, Registry of Deeds, Land Bank of the Philippines, National Commission on Indigenous Peoples, and Department of Interior and Local Government.