and it was heralded by the mining industry as the renaissance of the industry in the country. The new Mining Law provided a host of incentives to attract investors to establish their operations in mineralized areas in the country. These included fiscal incentives such as tax holidays, liberal profit sharing arrangements including allowing 100% foreign equity. Further, auxiliary rights consisting of (1) Timber Rights, and 2) Right of Way and Easement were afforded to investors. Throughout the terms of three Presidents: Fidel Ramos, Joseph Estrada and Gloria MacapagalArroyo, the promotion of the mining industry was a major priority. In fact, the government adopted even the official line that “Mining shall be the main driver of development for the new millennium.” The Mining Act of 1985 has had the biggest impact on the land rights of indigenous peoples. Majority of mining applications and operations are found within ancestral domains and in environmentally critical areas. Serious conflicts have arisen due to the establishment of a parallel and more powerful governance structure by the mining corporations, which often marginalized the traditional authority of the indigenous community. Further, the environmental destruction and introduction of alien value-systems into the ancestral domain of the peoples often resulted in violence and conflicts. Emergence and Establishment of ECOZONES Special Economic Zones or ECOZONES are selected areas in the country that are transformed into highly developed agro-industrial, tourist/ recreational, commercial, banking, investment, and financial centers, and where highly trained workers and efficient services will be made available to commercial enterprises. This began with the enactment of the Bases Conversion Act of 1992 or Republic Act No. 7227 which mandated the conversion of US Bases in the Philippines into other productive uses to promote economic development in Central Luzon and created the Subic Special Economic Zone, Subic Base Metropolitan Authority (SBMA) and the Clark Special Economic Zone. This law paved the way for the growth of more ECOZONES through the enactment of the Special Economic Zone Act of 1995 or Republic Act No. 7916. The first ECOZONES in the country were established in ancestral domains. As in the case of the Mining Act, new and more powerful governance structures and planning modalities were put in place, which supplanted the existing traditional leadership structures and resource management arrangements of the affected indigenous communities. Moreover, these new ECOZONES did not recognize the rights and ownership of the IPs over their ancestral domains. The Indigenous Peoples Rights Act (IPRA) In 1997, the landmark legislation known as the Indigenous Peoples Rights Act (IPRA) was enacted to recognize, protect and promote the rights of indigenous peoples. It is well-documented and there is evidence that centuries before the creation of the Philippine State, the various indigenous communities in the archipelago had been managing these resources since time immemorial through their traditional knowledge, systems and practices. This provided a venue and legal backbone for the recognition of the traditional rights of communities over their ancestral domain. The IPRA is seen as the most radical policy reform with regard to tenurial security of indigenous peoples in the region. The IPRA goes beyond Lok Niti 103