Taxing Properties and Managing Land: The Many Pathways on a Long Journey in the Philippines

Land management and real property tax reform have at least a forty-year history in the Philippines, underlining the immense political, social, technical, and institutional challenges of reforms in this area. The Asian Development Bank-financed REGALA project and its predecessor, the AusAID-financed Innovation Support Fund (ISF), adopted an approach that combined land management, and real property tax reforms. This enabled the local government units (LGUs) to generate increased revenues including from land management reforms, such as titling, that were not directly supported under the project. REGALA and ISF have demonstrated that reforms are doable at the local level when local and national government are committed and working in partnership. Land management and revenue generation can be strengthened by emphasizing locally-led development, technical capability building, use of integrated ICT systems, and opportunities for networking between national agencies and LGUs and between LGUs.