CLASSIFICATION AND SURVEY

Classification

The Secretary of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources has the power to:

(a) classify and survey lands of the public domain by studying, devising, determining and prescribing the
criteria, guidelines and methods for the proper and accurate classification and survey of all lands of the
public domain into: industrial or commercial, residential, resettlement, mineral, timber or forest,
grazing lands, and into such other classes as now or may later on be provided by law, rules and
regulations;

(b) determine which of the unclassified lands of public domain are needed for forest purposes and
declare them as permanent part of forest reserves; and

(c) decree lands not needed for forest purposes as alienable and disposable lands, the administrative
jurisdiction and management of which shall be transferred to the Bureau of Lands. Provided that
Mangrove and other swamps not needed for shore protection and suitable for fishpond purposes are
released to, and placed under the administrative jurisdiction and management of, the Bureau of
Fisheries and Aquatic Resources. Lands still to be classified continue to remain part of public forest.

Forest lands which have been subject of pasture leases and permits remain classified as forest
lands until classified as grazing lands. Its administration, management and disposition of grazing lands
shall remain under the Forest Management Bureau.

A. Concept of Forests and Forests Lands

As stated by the Court in Heirs of Amunategui v. Director of Forestry, “A forested area classified as
forest land of the public domain does not lose such classification simply because loggers or settlers may
have stripped it of its forest cover. Parcels of land classified as forest land may actually be covered with
grass or planted to crops by kaingin cultivators or other farmers. "Forest lands" do not have to be on
mountains or in out of the way places. Swampy areas covered by mangrove trees, nipa palms, and other
trees growing in brackish or sea water may also be classified as forest land. The classification is
descriptive of its legal nature or status and does not have to be descriptive of what the land actually
looks like. Unless and until the land classified as "forest" is released in an official proclamation to that
effect so that it may form part of the disposable agricultural lands of the public domain, the rules on
confirmation of imperfect title do not apply.”

B. Public forests or forests reserves are not capable of private appropriation

General rule: Public forest lands or forest reserves are part of inalienable lands of the public domain
in accordance with the Regalian doctrine and thus, not capable of private appropriation.

Exception: They may be capable of appropriation if declassified and released by positive acts of the
government. The prerogative of classifying or reclassifying lands of the public domain belongs to the
government and not the court. The onus to prove that a land subject to registration is alienable and
disposable belongs to the applicant.

C. The IPRA converts ancestral lands as public agricultural lands for registration purposes

For purposes of registration, RA No. 8371 otherwise known as Indigenous Peoples Rights Acts
(IPRA) converts ancestral lands into public agricultural land which may be disposed by the State.

*There is no need to secure a separate certification that the ancestral land is A and D in character, it
being sufficient to show that the land is duly identified, delimited, and certified as such.

D. Topography

General rule: Lands that have a slope of 18% or over cannot be classified as alienable and disposable
nor any forest land fifty per cent (50%) in slope or over, as grazing land. If already classified as
Alienable and Disposable, it shall be reverted as forest lands by the DENR Secretary.

Exception: When there are vested rights—the land is already covered by existing titles or approved
public land applications, or actually occupied openly, continuously, adversely, and publicly for a
period of not less than 30 years as of effectivity of PD 705, where the occupant is qualified for a free
patent under the Public Land Act.

Exception to the Exception: When public interest so requires, steps shall be taken to expropriate,
cancel defective titles, reject public land application, or eject occupants thereof.
E. Areas needed for forest purposes
1. Areas less than 250 hectares which are far from, or are not contiguous with, any certified
alienable and disposable land;
2. Isolated patches of forest of at least five (5) hectares with rocky terrain, or which protect a
spring for communal use;
3. Areas which have already been reforested;
4. Areas within forest concessions which are timbered or have good residual stocking to
support an existing, or approved to be established, wood processing plant;
5. Areas within forest concessions which are timbered or have good residual stocking to
support an existing, or approved to be established, wood processing plant;
6. Appropriately located road-rights-or-way;
7. Twenty-meter strips of land along the edge of the normal high waterline of rivers and
streams with channels of at least five (5) meters wide;
8. Strips of mangrove or swamplands at least twenty (20) meters wide, along shorelines facing
oceans, lakes, and other bodies of water, and strips of land at least twenty (20) meters wide
facing lakes;
9. Areas needed for other purposes, such as national parks, national historical sites, game
refuges and wildlife sanctuaries, forest station sites, and others of public interest; and
10. Areas previously proclaimed by the President as forest reserves, national parks, game
refuge, bird sanctuaries, national shrines, national historic sites.

*In case an area falling under any of the foregoing categories shall have been titled in favor of any
person, steps shall be taken, if public interest so requires, to have said title cancelled or amended, or
the titled area expropriated.

F. Mangrove swamps are in the category of forests

Mangrove is a community of intertidal plants including all species of trees, shrubs, vines, and
herbs found on coasts, swamp or border camps. Mangrove swamps or manglares are comprised
within the public forests of the Philippines. It is settled that mangrove swamps are forestall and not
alienable agricultural land as reaffirmed in Director of Forestry v. Villareal G.R. No. L-32266, where
the Court categorically declared that mangrove swamps form part of the public forests and, thus,
not subject to disposition.
 They cannot be subject of adverse possession and consequent ownership. They must first be
released as agricultural land by the Director of Forest Development.

The Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources has no jurisdiction to administer or dispose of
swamplands or mangrove lands forming a part of the public domain until such lands have been
released for fishery purposes.

G. Forest lands are not registrable

In Yngson v. Sec. of Agriculture it was held that the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources has
no jurisdiction to administer and dispose of swamplands or mangrove lands forming part of the public
domain while such lands are still classified as forestland or timberland and not released for fishery or
other purposes.

As ruled in the case of Republic v. Court of Appeals and Carantes, it is already a settled rule that
forest lands or forest reserves are not capable of private appropriation and possession thereof, however
long, cannot convert them into private property unless such lands are reclassified and considered as
alienable and disposable by the Director of Forestry, but even then, possession of the land by the
applicants prior to the reclassification of the land as disposable and alienable cannot be credited as part
of the thirty-year requirement under Sec. 48(b) of the Public Land Act.

In Republic vs. Court of Appeals and Bernabe it states there that “The transfer to innocent
purchasers for value does not divest the government of its right to cancel the titles. It is well-settled that
a certificate of title is void, when it covers property of public domain classified as forest or timber and
mineral lands. Any title issued on non-disposable lots even in the hands of an alleged innocent
purchaser for value, shall be cancelled. In the case at bar, it will be noted that in granting titles to the
land in dispute, the lower court counted the period of possession of private respondents before the
same were released as forest lands for disposition, which release is tantamount to qualifying the latter
to a grant on said lands while they were still non-disposable.”

Establishment of boundaries of forest lands

All boundaries between permanent forests and alienable and disposable lands shall be clearly
marked and maintained on the ground, with infrastructure or roads, or concrete monuments at intervals
of not more than five hundred (500) meters in accordance with established procedures and standards,
or any other visible and practicable signs to insure protection of the forest.
Reservations in forestlands and off-shore areas

The President may:

a. establish within any lands of the public domain, forest reserve and forest reservation for the
national park system, for preservation as critical watersheds, or for any other purpose; and
b. modify boundaries of existing ones

The DENR Secretary may:

-reserve and establish any portion of the public forest or forest reserve as site or experimental forest for
use of the Forest Research Institute.

* When public interest so requires, any off-shore area needed for the preservation and protection of its
educational, scientific, historical, ecological and recreational values including the marine life found
therein, shall be established as marine parks.

Reservation of Land, covered by a timber concession, for experiment station vest is the grantee full
ownership thereof

In International Hardwood and Veneer Co. vs University of the Philippines, When the
government ceded and transferred the property to UP, the Republic of the Philippines completely
removed it from the public domain and, more specifically, in respect to the areas covered by the timber
license of petitioner, removed and segregated it from a public forest; it divested itself of its rights and
title thereto and relinquished and conveyed the same to the UP; and made the latter the absolute
owner thereof, subject only to the existing concession. The proviso regarding existing concessions refers
to the timber license of petitioner. It means that the right of petitioner as a timber licensee must not be
affected, impaired or diminished; it must be respected. But, insofar as the Republic of the Philippines is
concerned, all its rights as grantor of the license were effectively assigned, ceded and conveyed to UP as
a consequence of the above transfer of full ownership.