3. Community Sketch Maps
After discussions in homes, sitios and barangays, meetings among the elders and adults were facilitated
to produce the community sketch maps. The community sketch maps set the limits of the boundaries,
document the place names, the location of camps, sitios and larger villages, the resources found in the
ancestral waters, clan caves, forests, mountain ranges, inland lakes and rivers. Using these community
sketch maps, the boundary corners for land areas and the survey path for marine boundaries were set.
Further meetings finalized the survey plans for each claim and the foundations set the preparations
needed for the on-ground survey, such as gasoline, bancas, boat captains, the composition of the survey
party, rice and other supplies. There were no contiguous boundaries among the seven foundations since
the four adjacent barangays in the north, namely Turda, Buenavista, Malawig, and the Tara islands,
agreed to be covered by a single ancestral domain claim.
4. Global Positioning System (GPS) Surveys
A series of surveys were conducted beginning July of 1996 using GPS or global positioning system receivers.
GPS is a satellite positioning system that, coupled with differential correction and post-processing
software, produced resource-grade boundary surveys with an accuracy of at least five meters. The data
gathered from the surveys supplied the technical description of the boundaries. The boundary surveys
were transposed on to digitized 1:50,000 maps from the National Mapping and Resource Information
Authority (NAMRIA). Finally, the information contained in the sketch maps, namely the natural resources
traditionally used by the Tagbanwa clans, the location of sitios and villages, burial caves, the panyaan and
other taboo areas, and the contents of the ancestral waters tagged with the correct Tagbanwa names,
were added onto to the community-generated map.
5. Map Validation
GPS surveys were conducted in Coron beginning July
1996. The maps were validated in the area and among
Saragpunta’s leaders through a lengthy process of
consultations and revisions. Not a few elders and
leaders were particular about the symbols used on the
maps. During foundation meetings, several features
on the maps and other sensitive information were
excluded to protect them from poachers and other
pirates. The technical descriptions were re-translated
from Tagbanwa to Tagalog as a concession to DENR
personnel. Finally, unlike the boundary corners for
ancestral lands, the DENR had yet to prescribe the
format for technical descriptions for marine boundaries.
After the series of meetings to validate the communitygenerated maps, the final maps of the three ancestral
12
Map 2. Polygons indicate all Ancestral Domain Claims of
Tagbanwa Communities in the Calamianes Island Group
as of 2017
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