BACKGROUND According to latest data from the UNDP, “the Philippines is a culturally diverse country with an estimated 14- 17 million Indigenous Peoples (IPs) belonging to 110 ethno-linguistic groups. They are mainly concentrated in Northern Luzon (Cordillera Administrative Region, 33%) and Mindanao (61%), with some groups in the Visayas area. The Philippine Constitution, in recognition of this diversity and under the framework of national unity and development, mandates state recognition, protection, promotion, and fulfillment of the rights of Indigenous Peoples. Further, Republic Act 8371, also known as the “Indigenous Peoples Rights Act” (1997, IPRA), recognized the right of IPs to manage their ancestral domains; it has become the cornerstone of current national policy on IPs.”2 While this is so, the ancestral domains has also become a bane affecting the totality of indigenous wellbeing in the country disproportionately impacting on indigenous women’s multiple roles. It also impinges on their right to full development as individuals and citizens of the state. As elaborated by the UNSRIP Victoria Tauli Corpuz, “ Land appropriation is not gender neutral and indigenous women’s rights interact with violations of collective land rights…The gendered effects of those violations become manifest in situations where indigenous women lose their traditional livelihoods such as food gathering, agricultural production, herding, among others, while compensation and jobs following land seizure tend to benefit the male members of indigenous communities. The loss of land and exclusion of women can create vulnerability to abuse and violence such as sexual violence, exploitation and trafficking. Additionally, the secondary effects of violation of land rights such as loss of livelihood and ill health, often disproportionately impact women in their roles as caregivers and guardians of the local environment.”3 In the Philippines, indigenous peoples’ struggles, since history, has always been related to the protection of their territories from encroachment and the exploitation of the resources therein that they have sustained through generations. In the light of the current trend for globalization and economic liberalization, indigenous peoples territories have been subject to appropriation and expropriation without the benefit of genuine consent from indigenous peoples. Indigenous women, dependent of the land and resources, are not separate from these community struggles as may be seen in the recent waves of evacuation of Lumad communities in Mindanao. Studies have often noted that “The indigenous peoples, to a large extent “forgotten” by the government, are in the midst of problems. Physical isolation                                                                                                                 2  United  Nations  Development  Programme.  Fast  Facts:  Indigenous  Peoples  in  the  Philippines.  24  July   2013,  www.ph.undp.org/2.   3  Report  of  the  UNSRIP  Victoria  Tauli  Corpuz  to  the  13th    Session  of  the  UNHRC,  6  August  2015.   A/HRC/30/41     6