Short answer. Yes, if you take the crops. Article 443 attaches the cost to the harvest: whoever receives the fruits owes the third person what was spent producing, gathering and preserving them. You are free instead to leave the standing crop to him. What you cannot do is keep the harvest and refuse the bill.
What the law says
He who receives the fruits has the obligation to pay the expenses made by a third person in their production, gathering, and preservation.
Civil Code, Article 443 — Expenses on Fruits. Read the full provision →
The obligation follows the harvest, not the judgment
The article is triggered by an act, not by a status. It speaks of he who receives the fruits, so winning the case is not what makes you liable — collecting the standing crop is. A landowner who takes possession after the planting season is over, when the crop has already been harvested and carried away by the person who grew it, has received no fruits and owes nothing under this provision. The moment you appropriate a crop somebody else paid to bring to maturity, the expense side of that crop comes with it.
Which expenses the planter can actually charge
Three categories, and the wording is exhaustive: production, gathering, and preservation. Seed, seedlings, fertiliser, the labour of planting and weeding, irrigation for that crop, the cost of harvesting it, and what it took to keep the harvested produce from spoiling before it changed hands. What falls outside is money spent on the land rather than on the fruits — clearing, levelling, a new access road, a pump house. Those may be recoverable on some other footing, but they are not expenses of this crop and this article does not reach them.
You have a genuine choice, and it is worth pricing
Because the duty is conditioned on receiving the fruits, declining them is a real option. Where the expenses claimed approach or exceed what the produce is worth — a crop that failed, one that was tended expensively and yielded little — the sensible course is to let the planter take it and walk away owing nothing. That decision has to be made before you harvest or sell, though. Once the crop is in your hands or converted into money, you have received the fruits and the choice has been made for you.
What settles the amount
Disputes here are almost always about quantum rather than principle, so the planter's paper decides them: receipts for seed and inputs, payroll or contracts for farm labour, delivery records, and the dates showing when each cost was incurred. Match those against the planting and harvest cycle — costs booked before the season in question, or after the crop was taken, do not belong in the claim. Photographs and a dated survey of what was actually standing on the land when you took possession are worth having before anyone starts clearing.
Cases citing this provision
These Supreme Court decisions cite the provision above. We list them so you can read them yourself; the summaries of what each decided are not ours to give.
- National Housing Authority vs. Manila Seedling Bank Foundation, G.R. No. 183543, June 20, 2016 — read the decision on LawPhil →