MANUEL CAMUS AND RAFAEL CAMUS, PETITIONERS, VS. COURT OF AGRARIAN RELATIONS, TIBURCIO HILARIO, ET AL., VICENTE PASCUAL, RUFINO DE LA CRUZ, ET AL., RESPONDENTS.

Respondents here (with the exception of respondent Court of Agrarian
Relations) filed a petition in said Court against Manuel Camus and
Rafael Camus, now petitioners before us. It is there alleged that
petitioners, owners of a fishpond in the municipality of Sagay,
Occidental Negros, engaged respondents as tenants in 1949; that the
conditions of their tenancy were that said respondents were to “work,
excavate and convert” the fishpond into saltbeds, with petitioners
defraying the expenses for that purpose, and that thereafter
petitioners and respondents would divide the salt produce between them,
share and share alike; that respondents were able to make 485 parcels
of saltbeds; and that subsequently they were ejected as tenants, some
in 1955, some in 1956 and others in 1957. They therefore prayed for
liquidation and accounting of the salt produce from 1949 to 1957 and
payment to them of their share, for reinstatement as tenants and for
damages and attorney’s fees.

Petitioners filed a motion to dismiss on the ground that respondent
Court was without jurisdiction over the case, since the same did not
involve any question relating to tenancy of agricultural land. The
motion was denied, as was the subsequent motion to reconsider the order
of denial, whereupon the instant petition for review by certiorari was
commenced, with a prayer for preliminary injunction, which we granted
to stop further proceedings below in the meantime.

The issue of jurisdiction turns on whether or not the relationship
between the parties under the agreement above set forth is one of
agricultural tenancy or tenancy of agricultural and within the meaning
of the law creating the Court of Agrarian Relations and prescribing the
scope of its authority (R. A. No. 1267, as amended by R. A. 1409)
Section 1 of this law states the purpose of the creation of said court,
namely, “for the enforcement of all laws and regulations governing the
relation of capital and labor on all agricultural lands under any
system of cultivation.” Section 7 confers original and exclusive
jurisdiction on the court “to consider, investigate, decide, and settle
all questions, matters, controversies or disputes involving all those
relationships established by law which determine the varying rights of
persons in the cultivation and usn of agricultural land where one of
the parties work the land.”

The land involved here was originally a fishpond, converted into
saltbedss. As fishpond it was agricultural in character, devoted to
agricultural pumoses. Has its conversion into saltbeds changed that
character? In other words, has the change in the use of the land worked
a transformation in its basic classification, from, agricultural to
mineral, considering that salt is by scientific definition a mineral
substance? The questions undoubtedly call for a negative answer.
Insofar as the process of salt production in this case is concerned the
kind of land used as evaporating basin is a matter of indifference. The
basin indeed could just as well be a cement or mental receptacle, or
any flat surface where brine or sea water can be let in and allowed to
evaporate, leaving the solid salt content. The fact that such
receptacle is used as an indispensable accessory to the operation does
not change its basic character, any more than it would convert
agricultural into mineral land, the latter being, according to the
Mining Act (Section 8), land which contains natural deposits of
valuable minerals “in sufficient quantity and quality to justify the
necessary expenditure to be incurred in extracting and utilizing” them.

Petitioners point out, however, that although the land itself is
agricultural salt production is not an agricultural process, that it is
not “cultivation” as the term is used in section 7 of Republic Act No.
1267, as amended, since agriculture refers to the culture of viable
organic matter on the ground, such as preparing it for the reception of
seeds or plants, sowing and planting, rearing and gathering the crops,
care of fruit trees and domestic animals. But the same provision in
defining the jurisdiction of the Court of Agrarian Relations, speaks
not only of “cultivation” but also of “use” of agricultural land “where
one of the parties work the land,” and includes within such
jurisdiction “all those relationships established by law” between said
parties. The land involved in the present case is agricultural land the
use of which—if not the cultivation—is the tie that binds the parties
in tenancy relation.

But whatever doubt there might be from the standpoint of semantics
or of word definition the doubt is resolved by the law itself,
specifically the Agricultural Tenancy Act (R. A. No. 1199), entitled
“An act to govern the relations between landholders and tenants of
agricultural lands.” Section 46, which prescribes the consideration for
the use of land under the leasehold tenancy system (as distinguished
from the share tenancy system) classifies lands according to the crops
produced thereon, and provides in its subsection (c) that “the
consideration for the use of sugar lands, fishponds, saltbeds and of
land devoted to the raising of livestock shall be governed by
stipulations between the parties.” Saltbeds are again mentioned,
together with fishponds and land principally planted to permanent fruit
trees, in Section 35 of the new Agricultural Reform Code (R. A. 3844)
and expressly left to be governed by the former statute, R. A. No.
1199. All this shows the clear intention of Congress to include
saltbeds within the purview of the tenancy laws, disputes concerning
which come under the jurisdiction of the Court of Agrarian Relations.

The questioned orders of respondent Court are affirmed, the writ of
preliminary injunction is dissolved and the case remanded for further
proceedings. Costs against petitioners.

Bengzon, C. J., Padilla, Bautista Angelo, Concepcion, Reyes, J. B. L., Paredes, and Regala, JJ., concur.