The Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) has expanded the implementation of the Support to Parcelization of Lands for Individual Titling (SPLIT) Project in Negros Island Region (NIR), with the distribution of an initial 71 electronic land titles (e-titles) in northern Negros this year.
Project SPLIT aims to fast-track the subdivision of the Collective Certificate of Land Ownership Award (CCLOA) to allow farmer-beneficiaries to have full ownership of the land they are cultivating in consonance with the directive of President Ferdinand R. Marcos, Jr. to accelerate the distribution of land titles.
At the Kape at Balitang Agraryo radio program yesterday, DAR-NIR Director Lucrecia Taberna said the latest e-titles, covering a total area of 42.3174 hectares, were distributed and awarded to agrarian reform beneficiaries (ARBs) in the municipalities of Calatrava, Toboso, E.B. Magalona, and Murcia on March 26 and 27.
She said they are expediting the conduct of subdivision surveys in other landholdings that were already field-validated.
Latest data showed that more than 117,000 hectares of landholdings in the region have been field-validated and are awaiting redocumentation under Project SPLIT.
“We will complete it in the second quarter of 2025,” Taberna said.
Last year, more than 16,500 e-titles were distributed by the DAR-NIR.
Among these are the 2,038 e-titles, covering 1,368.8 hectares, distributed to 1,235 ARBs during the President’s visit to Bago City in April.
In December, 4,348 e-titles were issued to 2,220 ARBs covering 2,517 hectares, in a distribution rite held in Cadiz City.
A flagship initiative of DAR with World Bank funding, the project began in 2021 and was supposed to end in 2024 but has been extended until 2027.
Project SPLIT is expected to benefit more than 1.14 million ARBs by providing them with individual titles to about 1.38 million hectares of agricultural land through the subdivision of CCLOAs.
“The Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program [CARP] promotes social justice. Through the Project SPLIT, we ensure the full implementation of CARP,” Taberna said. (PNA)