270 Phil.

151

EN BANC

[ G.R. No. 86889, December 04, 1990 ]

LUZ FARMS, PETITIONER, VS. THE HONORABLE SECRETARY OF THE

DECISION

PARAS, J.:
This is a petition for prohibition with prayer for restraining order and/or preliminary and
permanent injunction against the Honorable Secretary of the Department of
Agrarian Reform for acting without jurisdiction in enforcing the assailed provisions of R.A.
No. 6657, otherwise known as the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Law of 1988 and in
promulgating the Guidelines and Procedure Implementing Production and Profit Sharing
under R.A. No. 6657, insofar as the same apply to herein petitioner, and further from
performing an act in violation of the constitutional rights of the petitioner.
As gathered from the records, the factual background of this case, is as follows:
On June 10, 1988, the President of the Philippines approved R.A. No. 6657, which
includes the raising of livestock, poultry and swine in its coverage (Rollo, p. 80).
On January 2, 1989, the Secretary of Agrarian Reform promulgated the Guidelines and
Procedures Implementing Production and Profit Sharing as embodied in Sections 13 and
32 of R.A. No. 6657 (Rollo, p. 80).
On January 9, 1989, the Secretary of Agrarian Reform promulgated its Rules and
Regulations implementing Section 11 of R.A. No. 6657 (Commercial Farms). (Rollo, p.
81).
Luz Farms, petitioner in this case, is a corporation engaged in the livestock and poultry
business and together with others in the same business allegedly stands to be adversely
affected by the enforcement of Section 3(b), Section 11, Section 13, Section 16(d) and
17 and Section 32 of R.A. No. 6657 otherwise known as Comprehensive Agrarian Reform
Law and of the Guidelines and Procedures Implementing Production and Profit Sharing
under R.A. No. 6657 promulgated on January 2, 1989 and the Rules and Regulations
Implementing Section 11 thereof as promulgated by the DAR on January 9,
1989 (Rollo, pp. 2-36).
Hence, this petition praying that aforesaid laws, guidelines and rules be declared
unconstitutional. Meanwhile, it is also prayed that a writ of preliminary injunction or
restraining order be issued enjoining public respondents from enforcing the same, insofar
as they are made to apply to Luz Farms and other livestock and poultry raisers.
This Court in its Resolution dated July 4, 1989 resolved to deny, among others, Luz
Farms' prayer the issuance of a preliminary injunction in its Manifestation dated May 26
and 31, 1989. (Rollo, p. 98).
Later, however, this Court in its Resolution dated August 24, 1989 resolved to grant said
Motion for Reconsideration regarding the injunctive relief, after the filing and approval by
this Court of an injunction bond in the amount of P100,000.00. This Court also gave due
course to the petition and required the parties to file their respective memoranda
(Rollo, p. 119).
The petitioner filed its Memorandum on September 6, 1989 (Rollo, pp. 131-168).
On December 22, 1989, the Solicitor General adopted his Comment to the petition as his
Memorandum (Rollo, pp. 186-187).
Luz Farms questions the following provisions of R.A. 6657, insofar as they are made to
apply to it:
(a) Section 3(b) which includes the "raising of livestock (and poultry)" in the definition of
"Agricultural, Agricultural Enterprise or Agricultural Activity."
(b) Section 11 which defines "commercial farms" as "private agricultural lands devoted
to commercial, livestock, poultry and swine raising x x x."
(c) Section 13 which calls upon petitioner to execute a production-sharing plan.
(d) Section 16(d) and 17 which vest on the Department of Agrarian Reform the authority
to summarily determine the just compensation to be paid for lands covered by the
Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Law.
(e) Section 32 which spells out the production-snaring plan mentioned in Section 13 -?
"x x x (W)hereby three percent (3%) of the gross sales from the production of such lands
are distributed within sixty (60) days of the end of the fiscal year as compensation to
regular and other farmworkers in such lands over and above the compensation they
currently receive: Provided, That these individuals or entities realize gross sales in
excess of five million pesos per annum unless the DAR, upon proper application,
determine a lower ceiling.
In the event that the individual or entity realizes a profit, an additional ten (10%) of the net
profit after tax shall be distributed to said regular and other farmworkers within ninety (90)
days of the end of the fiscal year. x x x."
The main issue in this petition is the constitutionality of Sections 3(b), 11, 13 and 32 of
R.A. No. 6657 (the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Law of 1988), insofar as the said
law includes the raising of livestock, poultry and swine in its coverage as well as the
Implementing Rules and Guidelines promulgated in accordance therewith.
The Constitutional provision under consideration reads as follows:
ARTICLE XIII
xxx xxx xxx
AGRARIAN AND NATURAL RESOURCES REFORM
Section 4. The State shall, by law, undertake an agrarian reform program founded on the
right of farmers and regular farmworkers, who are landless, to own directly or collectively
the lands they till or, in the case of other farmworkers, to receive a just share of the fruits
thereof. To this end, the State shall encourage and undertake the just distribution of all
agricultural lands, subject to such priorities and reasonable retention limits as the
Congress may prescribe, taking into account ecological, developmental, or equity
considerations, and subject to the payment of just compensation. In determining retention
limits, the State shall respect the rights of small landowners. The State shall further
provide incentives for voluntary land-sharing.
xxx xxx xxx."
Luz Farms contended that it does not seek the nullification of R.A. 6657 in its entirety. In
fact, it acknowledges the correctness of the decision of this Court in the case of the
Association of Small Landowners in the Philippines, Inc. vs. Secretary of Agrarian Reform
(G.R. 78742, 14 July 1989) affirming the constitutionality of the Comprehensive Agrarian
Reform Law. It, however, argued that Congress in enacting the said law has transcended
the mandate of the Constitution, in including land devoted to the raising of livestock,
poultry and swine in its coverage (Rollo, p. 131). Livestock or poultry raising is not similar
to crop or tree farming. Land is not the primary resource in this
undertaking and represents no more than five percent (5%) of the total investment of
commercial livestock and poultry raisers. Indeed, there are many owners of residential
lands all over the country who use available space in their residences for commercial
livestock and raising purposes, under "contract-growing arrangements," whereby they
supplement the requirements of meat processing corporations and other commercial
livestock and poultry raisers (Rollo, p. 10). Lands support the buildings and other
amenities attendant to the raising of animals and birds. The use of land is incidental to
but not the principal factor or consideration in productivity in this industry. Excluding
backyard raisers, about 80% of those in commercial livestock and poultry production
occupy five hectares or less. The remaining 20% are mostly corporate farms (Rollo, p.
11).
On the other hand, the public respondent argued that livestock and poultry
raising is embraced in the term "agriculture" and the inclusion of such enterprise under
Section 3(b) of R.A. 6657 is proper. He cited that Webster's International Dictionary,
Second Edition (1954), defines the following words:
"Agriculture - the art or science of cultivating the ground and raising and harvesting crops,
often, including also, feeding, breeding and management of livestock, tillage, husbandry,
farming.
It includes farming, horticulture, forestry, dairying, sugarmaking x x x.
Livestock - domestic animals used or raised on a farm, especially for profit.
Farm - a plot or tract of land devoted to the raising of domestic or other animals." (Rollo,
pp. 82-83).
The petition is impressed with merit.
The question raised is one of constitutional construction. The primary task in
constitutional construction is to ascertain and thereafter assure the realization of the
purpose of the framers in the adoption of the Constitution (J.M. Tuazon & Co. vs. Land
Tenure Administration, 31 SCRA 413 [1970]).
Ascertainment of the meaning of the provision of Constitution begins with the language
of the document itself. The words used in the Constitution are to be given their ordinary
meaning except where technical terms are employed in which case the significance thus
attached to them prevails (J.M. Tuazon & Co. vs. Land Tenure Administration, 31 SCRA
413 [1970]).
It is generally held that, in construing constitutional provisions which are ambiguous or of
doubtful meaning, the courts may consider the debates in the constitutional convention
as throwing light on the intent of the framers of the Constitution. It is true that the intent
of the convention is not controlling by itself, but as its proceeding was preliminary to the
adoption by the people of the Constitution the understanding of the convention as to what
was meant by the terms of the constitutional provision which was the subject of the
deliberation, goes a long way toward explaining the understanding of the people when
they ratified it (Aquino, Jr. v. Enrile, 59 SCRA 183 [1974]).
The transcripts of the deliberations of the Constitutional Commission of 1986 on the
meaning of the word "agricultural," clearly show that it was never the intention of the
framers of the Constitution to include livestock and poultry industry in the coverage of the
constitutionally-mandated agrarian reform program of the Government.
The Committee adopted the definition of "agricultural land" as defined under Section 186
of R.A. 3844, as land devoted to any growth. Including but not limited to crop
lands, saltbeds, fishponds, idle and abandoned land (Record, CONCOM, August 7, 1986,
Vol. III, p. 11).
The intention of the Committee is to limit the application of the word "agriculture."
Commissioner Jamir proposed to insert the word "ARABLE" to distinguish this kind of
agricultural land from such lands as commercial and industrial lands and residential
properties because all of them fall under the general classification of the word
"agricultural". This proposal, however, was not considered because the Committee
contemplated that agricultural lands are limited to arable and suitable agricultural lands
and therefore, do not include commercial, industrial and residential lands (Record,
CONCOM, August 7, 1986, Vol. III, p. 30).
In the interpellation, then Commissioner Regalado (now a Supreme Court Justice), posed
several questions, among others, quoted as follows:
xxx xxx xxx
"Line 19 refers to genuine reform program founded on the primary right of farmers
and farmworkers. I wonder if it means that leasehold tenancy is thereby proscribed under
this provision because it speaks of the primary right of farmers and farmworkers to own
directly or collectively the lands they till. As also mentioned by
Commissioner Tadeo, farmworkers include those who work in piggeries and poultry
projects.
I was wondering whether I am wrong in my appreciation that if somebody puts up a
piggery or a poultry project and for that purpose hires farmworkers therein,
these farmworkers will automatically have the right to own eventually, directly or ultimately
or collectively, the land on which the piggeries and poultry projects were
constructed. (Record, CONCOM, August 2, 1986, p. 618).
xxx xxx xxx."
The questions were answered and explained in the statement of then
Commissioner Tadeo, quoted as follows:
xxx xxx xxx
"Sa pangalawang katanungan ng Ginoo ay medyo hindi kami nagkaunawaan. Ipinaaala
m ko kay Commissioner Regalado na hindi namin inilagay ang agricultural
worker sa kadahilanang kasama rito ang piggery, poultry at livestock
workers. Ang inilagay namin dito ay farm worker kaya hindi kasama ang piggery, poultry
at livestock workers (Record, CONCOM, August 2, 1986, Vol. II, p. 621).
It is evident from the foregoing discussion that Section II of R.A. 6657 which includes
"private agricultural lands devoted to commercial livestock, poultry and swine raising" in
the definition of "commercial farms" is invalid, to the extent that the aforecited agro-
industrial activities are made to be covered by the agrarian reform program of the
State. There is simply no reason to include livestock and poultry lands in the coverage
of agrarian reform (Rollo, p. 21).
Hence, there is merit in Luz Farms' argument that the requirement in Sections 13 and 32
of R.A. 6657 directing "corporate farms" which include livestock and poultry raisers to
execute and implement "production-sharing plans" (pending final redistribution of their
landholdings) whereby they are called upon to distribute from three percent (3%) of their
gross sales and ten percent (10%) of their net profits to their workers as additional
compensation is unreasonable for being confiscatory, and therefore violative of due
process (Rollo, p. 21).
It has been established that this Court will assume jurisdiction over a constitutional
question only if it is shown that the essential requisites of a judicial inquiry into such a
question are first satisfied. Thus, there must be an actual case or controversy involving a
conflict of legal rights susceptible judicial determination, the constitutional question must
have been opportunely raised by the proper party, and the resolution of the question is
unavoidably necessary to the decision of the case itself (Association of Small Landowners
of the Philippines, Inc. v. Secretary of Agrarian Reform, G.R. 78742; Acuna v. Arroyo,
G.R. 79310; Pabico v. Juico, G.R. 79744; Manaay v. Juico, G.R. 79777, 14 July 1989,
175 SCRA 343).
However, despite the inhibitions pressing upon the Court when confronted with
constitutional issues, it will not hesitate to declare a law or act invalid when it is convinced
that this must be done. In arriving at this conclusion, its only criterion will be the
Constitution and God as its conscience gives it in the light to probe its meaning and
discover its purpose. Personal motives and political considerations are irrelevancies that
cannot influence its decisions. Blandishment is as ineffectual as intimidation, for all the
awesome power of the Congress and Executive, the Court will not hesitate "to make the
hammer fall heavily," where the acts of these departments, or of any official, betray the
people's will as expressed in the Constitution (Association of Small Landowners of
Philippines, Inc. v. Secretary of Agrarian Reform, G.R. 78742; Acuna v. Arroyo, G.R.
79310; Pabico v. Juico, G.R. 79744; Manaay v. Juico, G.R. 79777, 14 July 1989).
Thus, where the legislature or the executive acts beyond the scope of its constitutional
powers, it becomes the duty of the judiciary to declare what the other branches of the
government had assumed to do as void. This is the essence of judicial power conferred
by the Constitution "(I)n one Supreme Court and in such lower courts as may be
established by law" (Art. VIII, Section 1 of the 1935 Constitution; Article X, Section I of the
1973 Constitution and which was adopted as part of the Freedom Constitution, and
Article VIII, Section 1 of the 1987 Constitution) and which power this Court has exercised
in many instances (Demetria v. Alba, 148 SCRA 208 [1987]).
PREMISES CONSIDERED, the instant petition is hereby GRANTED. Sections 3(b), 11,
13 and 32 of R.A. No. 6657 insofar as the inclusion of the raising of livestock, poultry and
swine in its coverage as well as the Implementing Rules and Guidelines promulgated in
accordance therewith, are hereby DECLARED null and void for being unconstitutional
and the writ of preliminary injunction issued is hereby MADE permanent.
SO ORDERED.