Association of Philippine Coconut Desiccators vs.

Philippine Coconut Authority

G.R. No. 110526
February 10, 1998
Facts:
On March 24, 1993 the Governmental Board of the PCA issued Resolution No. 018-93 stating
that it will no longer require applying for a license or a permit when engaging in coconut
processing or in such business and PCA will be limited to the monitoring of their volumes of
production and administration of quality standard. The Government Board of the PCA wants to
follow and further support the deregulation policy and effort of the government to promote free
enterprise. The PCA was created by Presidential Decree No. 232 and in P.D. No. 1468 it was
made an independent public corporation... directly reporting to, and supervised by, the President
of the Philippines... The APCD then filed a petition for mandamus to compel PCA to revoke B.R.
No. 018-93.
Issue:
Whether or not the petition should be granted.
Held:
Yes. The petition is granted PCA Resolution No. 018-93 and all certificates of registration under
it are hereby declared null and void for having been issued in excess of the power of the PCA to
adopt or issue. Because in the Resolution No. 018-93, PCA can no longer stop processing firms
go to areas which are already congested even in overproduction PCA cannot order a cut back in
their production trimming down the function of PCAs function to registration is not abdication
of the power to regulate but is regulation itself. Free enterprise does not call for the removal of
protective regulations for the benefit of the general public. In 1935 Constitution up to now
laissez-faire is repudiated as an economic principle. Although the present Constitution enshrines
free enterprise as a policy, it nonetheless reserves to the government the power to intervene
whenever necessary to promote the general welfare. This is so because under Art. XII of the
Constitution, Sections 6 and 19, it is clear that the government reserves the power to intervene
whenever necessary to promote the general welfare and when the public interest so requires. It is
beyond the power of an administrative agency to dismantle policy made by the legislative
department.