country’s total land area (see Map 1). There are 128 terrestrial sites designated as KBAs covering at least 7,610,943 ha in the country. Seventy-one of these KBAs or 55% of all KBAs overlap with ancestral domain titles. Further, almost 90% of all the remaining forest cover in the country can also be found in ancestral domain areas (see Map 2). Clearly, with the aforementioned data, a case could be made that the indigenous communities in the Philippines, through their traditional resource management systems, are the actual stewards who provide de-facto governance to the most important and environmentally significant areas in the country. The evidence is clear that the role they play in order to ensure the survival of the country has to be respected and recognized. National Laws, Policies, Programs, Structures, and Mechanisms Conservation and Protection Policies Efforts at conservation or management of natural resources (or a semblance of it) in the country officially began in June 1863 when the Spanish Regime created the Inspeccion General de Montes. The Americans renamed Inspeccion into ‘Forestry Bureau’ in 1900. It was reconstituted into the Bureau of Forestry in 1953 and later organized into the Bureau of Forest Development (BFD) in 1975. With the establishment of the BFD came the much reviled Forestry Code of 1975 which defined that “all lands of at least 18% slope and above are permanently part of the Forest Zone” and as such criminalized the “habitation and occupation of the Forest Zone without the express approval of the Government” (Revised Forestry Code, 1975). The Forestry Code of 1975 effectively rendered the existence of indigenous communities in the forest zone as illegal and provided a penal provision for the “arrest, prosecution and punishment” of violators of the Forestry Code. Under this regime, forest resources were placed under the full control of the state with all processing, distribution and utilization of the forest and its resources becoming the exclusive domain of the Government. Sadly, the Government mindset, which created such a policy environment, prevails in spite of the many advances of the IP sector through the years. In 1987, the BFD and the Wood Industry Development Authority (WIDA) merged to become the Forest Management Bureau (FMB) and the Protected Areas and Wildlife Bureau was created. In June 1992, the National Integrated Protected Areas System (NIPAS) was established in the Philippines. In 1995, the Community-Based Map 1. Areas covered by forest, key biodiversity areas, parks & protected areas, and ancestral domains in the Philippines. Lok Niti 101