- Where
- Ifugao province, Cordillera,
northern Luzon, Philippines - Coordinates
- 16.94° N
121.135° E (Batad) - UNESCO
- World Heritage since 1995
first cultural landscape - Clusters
- Five: Batad, Bangaan, Mayoyao,
Hungduan, Nagacadan - In Danger
- 2001 to 2012
(UNESCO’s Danger List) - Getting there
- Overnight bus from Manila
to Banaue, then road and foot - Advisory
- US: Philippines Level 2
(1 Sep 2026)
The road gave up before I did, and the last of the way was on foot along the tops of walls, with water on one side and a long drop on the other. Then the valley opened like a theatre, every seat a field, and a man on the lowest tier lifted his hat to me, and I waved back from somewhere up in the gods.
The short answer
The Rice Terraces of the Philippine Cordilleras are a UNESCO World Heritage Site on the island of Luzon, inscribed in 1995 as the first property ever listed in the cultural landscape category, Wikipedia records. The inscription covers five clusters, all in Ifugao province: the Batad and Bangaan terraces in the municipality of Banaue, Mayoyao Central in Mayoyao, Hungduan in Hungduan, and Nagacadan in Kiangan. The terraces most often photographed, seen from the viewpoint above Banaue town, are not among them: Wikipedia records that they were left out because of the many modern buildings among them, and that they are protected instead as a National Cultural Treasure, by Presidential Decree No. 260 of 1973. The terraces were built, and are still farmed, by the Ifugao people.
April 2011Terrace walls in Banaue, each narrow step holding a strip of water and rice.
Photograph: Cabajar · Viewpoint Banaue Rice Terraces · CC BY-SA 3.0 · cropped
Why it's worth knowing
A landscape that works. The terraces are stone- or mud-walled pond fields cut along the contours of the mountains, Wikipedia records, watered by irrigation systems that draw on the forests at the mountaintops. Each cluster is capped by a muyong, a privately owned forest kept under customary practice, which Wikipedia credits with about 264 native plant species; the forests feed the water that keeps the paddies wet all year. The Philippine Star reported in June 2026 that Batad’s terraces rise to about 1,100 metres above sea level like an amphitheatre, and that its heirloom rice is called tinawon, meaning ‘once a year’.
February 2010Batad village in its bowl of flooded terraces.
Photograph: Romain Pontida (Flickr) · Rice terraces near Banaue, Batad, Cordillera, North Luzon, Philippines (10226182665) · CC BY-SA 2.0 · cropped
Younger than the legend. UNESCO’s page describes the high rice fields of the Ifugao as following the contours of the mountains for 2,000 years, and the American anthropologist H. Otley Beyer put them at more than 2,000 years old, Wikipedia records. The Ifugao Archaeological Project, a research programme of the Save the Ifugao Terraces Movement and the University of California, Los Angeles, reads the evidence differently: its radiocarbon dating, plant remains and historical research showed, it says, that the terraces were built much later than previously assumed, alongside intensified Spanish colonial activity in the lowlands around the seventeenth century. On that reading the terraces were a response to colonial intrusion, built by people who moved into the mountains and stayed out of Spanish control.
The field notes
Twelve years in danger
UNESCO placed the terraces on its List of World Heritage in Danger in 2001, Wikipedia records, with deforestation, climate change and the departure of younger Ifugao from farming among the threats; the Philippines itself sought the listing, to draw support. UNESCO removed them from the Danger List in 2012, recognising improved conservation. The pressures Wikipedia lists have not gone away: giant earthworms and swamp eels that tunnel through the paddy walls, heavy rains from typhoons, farmers shifting from rice to vegetables, and paddies sold or built on for tourism.
Batad after the storm
In November 2025, during Super Typhoon Uwan, a landslide at Batad killed two people, tore apart one of the village’s old irrigation canals and damaged more than two hectares of paddies, affecting 150 farmers, the Philippine Star reported in June 2026; GMA Regional TV reported that Banaue declared a state of calamity. Villagers dug out the mud themselves in bachang, their communal work. In June 2026 the province’s agriculture and environment office estimated the repairs at 30 million pesos, and the governor, Jerry Dalipog, asked the national government for help; parts of the eroded slope were still exposed.
The chants and the guardians
The Ifugao’s epic chants, the hudhud, sung mainly by older women at rice sowing, at harvest and at funeral wakes, were proclaimed by UNESCO in 2001 and inscribed in 2008 on its Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity, Wikipedia records. The Ifugao are also known for their carving: the bulul, a wooden figure that guards the rice granary, standing for the ancestors.
January 2020A thatched Ifugao house raised on wooden posts in Batad village.
Photograph: Ekaterina Kvelidze · CC BY-SA 4.0 · cropped
June 2018Young rice on the lower terraces of Batad.
Photograph: Jophel Botero Ybiosa · CC BY-SA 4.0
- Walk on the walls only where the people who farm them walk, and step aside for anyone carrying a load.
- Start early, before the cloud lifts out of the valley, and sit still while it goes.
- Try counting the fields. (I got as far as the first bend, where the hillside folded over and began a whole new set. I have written ‘a great many’ and underlined it twice.)
- Eat the rice when it is offered, and ask its name. It has one.
- At the end of the day, sit on a wall and listen to the water finding its way down from one field to the next.
A bundle of tinawon rice from Batad. Tinawon is the heirloom rice of Batad’s terraces, and the name means ‘once a year’, the Philippine Star reported in June 2026, describing a grain valued for its aroma and grown without pesticides; Batad holds a harvest festival for it. The terraces it grows on are the village’s fields, worked by the families who own them.
Tally, in the marginA small bundle of rice still on the stalk, tied at the neck with a twist of grass. I took it for a souvenir and asked what I owed, and it was well into the afternoon before I understood that nobody was selling it. It was the whole year, tied up in one hand, and I had been holding it upside down.
Getting there
How to get there. By road from Manila to Banaue, about 375 kilometres by Wikipedia’s figure. Ohayami Trans, which runs a nightly bus from Manila, gives the ride as about nine to ten hours without road delays, and Wikivoyage, the travel wiki, lists other overnight buses from Manila and connections through Baguio, Bontoc and Sagada. Batad, the best-known of the five UNESCO clusters, has no road into the village: Wikivoyage describes a jeepney or tricycle from Banaue over the pass known as the Saddle, then a walk of twenty minutes or more down to the village, and paths along the tops of the terrace walls inside it. Bangaan is also in Banaue; Mayoyao, Hungduan and Kiangan are separate trips.
June 2018A water buffalo on a terrace path at Batad.
Photograph: Jophel Botero Ybiosa · CC BY-SA 4.0 · cropped
When to go. PAGASA, the Philippine weather service, divides the country’s year into a rainy season from June to November and a dry season from December to May. The Philippine Star reported that Batad held its Tinawon Rice Harvest Festival in June in 2026.
What to arrange ahead. Transport from Manila, a bed in Banaue or in the lodges above Batad, and a guide for the walks between villages, which Wikivoyage recommends hiring in Banaue. Banaue’s Municipal Tourism Office arranges tours and guides, Wikivoyage records. Roads in the Cordillera can be closed by landslides in the rainy season.
Safety. As read on 24 October 2026 from its advisory feed, the US State Department rates the Philippines Level 2, exercise increased caution, due to crime, terrorism, unrest and kidnapping, in an advisory dated 1 September 2026. It says not to travel to the Sulu Archipelago, including the southern Sulu Sea, or to Marawi City in Mindanao; to reconsider travel to certain other areas of Mindanao; and to take increased caution in certain rural and remote regions of Leyte, Mindoro, Negros and Samar. Ifugao, in the Cordillera of northern Luzon, is not named, and Mindanao is more than 900 kilometres to the south (this entry’s measurement). The hazards here are the mountains’ own: steep paths, and rain that brings landslides, as in November 2025, when one killed two people at Batad.
Mark this place
Common questions
Where are the Ifugao rice terraces?
The Ifugao rice terraces are in Ifugao province, in the Cordillera mountains of northern Luzon, the Philippines. UNESCO’s World Heritage Site, the Rice Terraces of the Philippine Cordilleras, covers five clusters there: Batad and Bangaan in Banaue, Mayoyao Central, Hungduan, and Nagacadan in Kiangan.
Are the Banaue Rice Terraces a UNESCO World Heritage Site?
Not the ones seen from the viewpoint above Banaue town. Wikipedia records that they were left out of UNESCO’s 1995 inscription because of the modern buildings among them, and are protected as a Philippine National Cultural Treasure; Batad and Bangaan, also in the municipality of Banaue, are inscribed.
How old are the Ifugao rice terraces?
The parties disagree. UNESCO’s page speaks of 2,000 years, as did the anthropologist H. Otley Beyer. The Ifugao Archaeological Project, from the Save the Ifugao Terraces Movement and UCLA, says radiocarbon dating and other evidence show the terraces were built around the seventeenth century, during intensified Spanish activity in the lowlands.
Why were the Ifugao rice terraces on UNESCO’s Danger List?
UNESCO listed the Rice Terraces of the Philippine Cordilleras as in danger from 2001 to 2012, Wikipedia records, with deforestation, climate change and young Ifugao leaving farming among the threats. The Philippines sought the listing to draw support, and UNESCO removed the terraces in 2012, recognising improved conservation.
How do you get to Batad?
By road from Manila to Banaue, about 375 kilometres, then by jeepney or tricycle over the pass called the Saddle and on foot into the village, which has no road, Wikivoyage, the travel wiki, records. Ohayami Trans, which runs the overnight bus from Manila to Banaue, gives the ride as about nine to ten hours without road delays.
What happened at Batad in November 2025?
During Super Typhoon Uwan in November 2025, a landslide at Batad, in Banaue, killed two people, tore apart one of its old irrigation canals and damaged over two hectares of rice paddies, affecting 150 farmers, the Philippine Star reported in June 2026; repairs were then still unfinished.
What is the hudhud of the Ifugao?
The hudhud is the Ifugao’s cycle of narrative chants, performed mainly by older women at rice sowing, at harvest and at funeral wakes. Wikipedia records that UNESCO proclaimed the Hudhud Chants of the Ifugao in 2001 and inscribed them in 2008 on its Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.
What level does the US State Department give the Philippines?
Level 2, exercise increased caution, in an advisory dated 1 September 2026, as read on 24 October 2026. It says not to travel to the Sulu Archipelago or Marawi City and to reconsider travel to certain other areas of Mindanao; Ifugao province, in northern Luzon, is not named.