Cordillera Administrative Region, Philippines

by Jaume Ollé, 12 January 2001

The Philippine Province of Abra is a basin drained by the Tineg (now also called Abra) River and almost completely rimmed by mountains. Most of the province is forested, yielding a number of woods including acacia and mahogany, and some is farmed, yielding rice, maize, bananas, coffee, and a few other crops, but eighteen percent is grassland, used mostly for rearing cattle and horses. Abra has a colorful history--lots of it blood-red. Its population is 208,000 by the 2000 census; the capital is the town of Bangued.
John Ayer, 4 April 2001

Benguet

by Jaume Ollé, 12 January 2001

The flag of Benguet province is well known because it is shown in Smith 1975. I have redrawn the seal which is placed on a white flag (1:2) as the provincial flag of Benguet. The province was created on 18 June 1966 (Act 4695) after the division of the Mountain province into four. Before that was the Commandancy during Spanish rule. After that Benguet was a subprovince of the Mountain province (after 18 August 1908) - Act 1876. The symbols in the seal: the Ambuklao and Binga hydro-electric plant; miner's tools; native basket or Kayabong; the forest of Benguet and its terrace-clad mountains. The central circle is a gong or Gansa, and symbolizes the highland culture of the natives. The provincial flower is the everlasting.
Source: the heraldic division of the Philippine presidency. All flags must be approved by the heraldic division before adoption. The book is written by Professor Galo Ocampo, chief of the department, (301 pages, full color) and the seals and flags (around 150 administrative divisions flags) are shown in great detail. The image in W. Smith's book may be a mistake or a variant flag make by the local manufacturers, because all the flags show in the book in ratio 1:2 and in Smith the ratio is 3:5
Jaume Ollé, 24 August 1997

I've lived in Benguet for over a year & have never seen the flag. It must be inside the government buildings.
Gene 'Duke' Duque, 25 September 1999

Ifugao and Benguet date from 1966, when the previous Mountain Province was quartered. Benguet, the southernmost province in the Cordillera Autonomous Region, has a population of 572,000 by the 2000 census, and contains the region's only city, Baguio, which, with a quarter million inhabitants, is more populous than any of the region's other five provinces (but the capital is the town of La Trinidad). Benguet, a plateau, is mostly forested, but the people grow fruits, vegetables, coffee, and cut flowers; Benguet is one of the country's major producers of cold-weather vegetables. The Igorot tribesmen mined gold before Magellan set sail, and mining of gold, silver, and copper is a major factor in the provincial economy to this day, as is commercial timbering. Tribal culture is much more seriously eroded here than in the rest of the region, as Benguet is much more industrialized and integrated into the economy of the outer world. The industry is powered largely by hydroelectric dams..
John Ayer, 4 April 2001

Baguio

by Dirk Schönberger, 12 January 2001

Source: Symbols of the state

"1909" refers to the year Baguio was declared a city.
Dion Fernandez, 6 March 2007

Ifugao

by Jaume Ollé, 12 January 2001

Ifugao and Benguet date from 1966, when the previous Mountain Province was quartered. Ifugao seems to be roughly as mountainous as Mountain Province. Here, too, the people cultivate rice on terraces held by stone walls, "stairways to the sky," the work of many centuries or perhaps millennia, and still continuing. The Ifugao raided the settlements in the lowlands well into the nineteenth century, when the Spanish first established a military presence in the highlands; tribal warfare was only ended in the American period. It was in Ifugao, on September 3, 1945, that General Yamashita surrendered himself and the sixteen thousand Japanese soldiers remaining under his command.

Ifugao's rice crop seems to be mostly for local consumption; the leading commercial crop is coffee. Maize, bananas, and a number of vegetables are grown, and the Ifugao are skilled woodworkers, potters, and metalworkers. The province encourages the development of light industry that will mesh with the people's established strengths: ceramics, garment, and toy manufacture, and food processing. Cut flower production is expanding. Tourism is said to be growing by eighteen percent per year. The population is 160,000 in eleven towns; the capital is Lagawe..
John Ayer, 5 April 2001

Kalinga-Apayao

by Jaume Ollé, 12 January 2001

[no longer in use]

The central part of northern Luzon is the Cordillera Autonomous Region, divided into six provinces. One, Apayao, appears to have a couple of miles of seacoast, just enough to separate Ilocos Norte from Cagayan. Apayao and Kalinga were separated in 1995, so we have only the flag of the undivided province. Apayao has a population of 97,000 on 2,928 sq.km. in seven towns, of which Kabugao (or Cabugao) is the capital. The population includes a considerable number of Ilocanos who have moved in to the river valleys since World War II, so in the Spanish era the population must have been quite sparse. The Spanish established control only in the late nineteenth century. The province is still mostly forest, cut by rivers so pure that some advocate bottling the water and selling it. The Apayao until recently practiced slash-and-burn agriculture, but are now taking up the stationary cultivation of rice. The province also produces maize, coffee, fruits, vegetables, and livestock. Tourism is described as "nascent."

Kalinga has a population of 173,000 (by the 2000 census) on 7,048 sq.km. in eight towns, of which Tabuk is the capital. The Kalingas speak a single language but are divided into thirty-six tribes. The province's water system consists mostly of the Chico River. They grow a great deal of rice, and also maize, coffee, fruits, vegetables, fruits, livestock, timber, rattan, and bamboo. They are also skilled in pottery, basket-weaving, and metalwork. In the 1970s the national government planned a series of hydroelectric dams along the Chico River, which would have pretty much wiped out the native culture, but after issuing a series of threats they were persuaded to forbear. "Kalinga" means "headhunter" and the name was not given lightly.
John Ayer, 4 April 2001

On 14-Feb-95 Kalinga/Apayao was dissolved into two provinces, Kalinga and Apayao.
Jay Allen Villapando, 15 June 2005

Mountain

by Jaume Ollé, 12 January 2001

What is now the Cordillera Autonomous Region was the Mountain Province until 1966, when the former sub-provinces of Apayao and Kalinga were fused into one province and the remainder was divided into four provinces. The present Mountain Province, 2,097 sq.km., is so rugged and high that frost has been know to occur! In fact, the Spanish were unable to establish an administrative presence her until after 1850, and the native culture is largely undisturbed. The population, by the 2000 census, is 140,000 in ten towns, of which the capital is Bontoc, a name that also applies to the people of the Mountain Province, their language, and their culture. By building terraces walled with stone, they manage to practice some agriculture, and they also practice a number of crafts, weaving, pottery, woodwork, bamboo-craft, rattan-craft, etc. The people of several of the Cordilleran provinces are said to make violins of bamboo. There are undisturbed deposits of gold, copper, and a number of construction materials.
John Ayer, 4 April 2001