Two Negros Occidental solons are filing a resolution in the House today calling for the review of the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Law for the purpose of seeking a just and fair distribution of lands to legitimate farm workers and tillers.

The resolution will be filed by Rep. Ignacio Arroyo (Neg. Occ., 5th district) and Rep. Jeffrey Ferrer (Neg. Occ., 4th district) following the call of President Gloria Arroyo in her State of the Nation Address for the legislators to act on land reform. The CARL ends next year.

"We must reform agrarian reform so it can transform beneficiaries into agribusinessmen," she told the joint houses of Congress.

In their proposed resolution, the two solons said "We have proclaimed the revival and development of the full potential of Philippine agriculture to be an economic priority of our new democracy to provide a firm foundation for the industrialization of our country."

Together with this agricultural revival and development, there is a need for the proper implementation of the existing agrarian reform program, they said.

Despite the president's pronouncement to ensure the proper implementation land reform, it is still considered a complex and controversial problem, Ferrer and Arroyo said.

There is still a wide gap between the land reform objective to uplift the lives of beneficiaries and its actual realization, they said. It is his time to finally review CARL to meet its declared objectives and to make its implementation workable between the landowners and the farmers and to improve its support services, they said.*CPG

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