Also known as: Lalawigan ng Agusan del Sur
Agusan del Sur is a province in Region XIII (Caraga). Population 741K (PSA 2024 census), 1 city + 13 municipalities, 314 barangays total, land area 9,989.52 km². Provincial capital: Prosperidad.
Agusan del Sur is a province in Region XIII (Caraga). Its capital is Prosperidad.
Agusan del Sur had 740,531 residents in the 2024 census (PSA 2024 Census of Population (POPCEN 2024), reference date July 1, 2024). That is the most recent official count. There is no 2026 census result, so any 2026 population figure is an estimate.
Agusan del Sur covers 9,989.52 km², per the PSA Philippine Statistical Yearbook figure used on this page.
Agusan del Sur has 1 component city and 13 municipalities (14 LGUs under the province), per PSA's Philippine Standard Geographic Code (2Q 2026), and 314 barangays.
Agusan del Sur's 1 component city is Bayugan City. Its 13 municipalities are Bunawan, Esperanza, La Paz, Loreto, Prosperidad, Rosario, San Francisco, San Luis, Santa Josefa, Sibagat, Talacogon, Trento and Veruela.
Agusan del Sur is the Philippines' 4th-largest province by land area and the only landlocked province in the Caraga region, its geography shaped by the Agusan River — the country's third-longest river — and the Agusan Marsh it feeds. The marsh, a Ramsar Wetland of International Importance since 1999 spanning six of the province's municipalities, is home to roughly 15,000 residents, about 60% of them Agusan Manobo living in traditional floating settlements that rise and fall with the water level.
Key industries: Rice (historically Caraga's top producer), Rubber (dominant within Caraga region), Oil palm (Caraga is the #2 oil-palm region nationally, most of it in this province), Agusan Marsh ecotourism
That marsh sits at the center of the province's defining land-use tension: agricultural expansion, including oil palm and rice cultivation, is actively pressuring the marsh's peatland edges, and roughly 4,000 hectares within or near it may be reclassified for irrigation use. Upstream mining pollution and a 2019 drought that drove an 11% decline in the marsh's bird population by 2020 add to the pressure on a wetland that already carries multiple layers of protected-area status.
Key industries: Rice (historically Caraga's top producer), Rubber (dominant within Caraga region), Oil palm (Caraga is the #2 oil-palm region nationally, most of it in this province), Agusan Marsh ecotourism
More on the regulatory framework: CLUP explainer · RA 7160 explainer · SGLG explainer · full glossary. Working a CLUP review cycle? Run the CLUP readiness self-check or see CLUP compliance monitoring.
A province where a Ramsar-protected wetland, an Indigenous floating-settlement community, and an expanding oil-palm and rice economy all compete for the same land is exactly the kind of conservation-versus-agriculture coordination problem a live PDPFP-to-CLUP dashboard is built to help a PPDO manage.
With oil palm expansion pressing on the Agusan Marsh's protected peatlands, Agusan del Sur's PPDO is managing a real conservation-versus-agriculture tradeoff. A Nova Gov pilot brings that alongside CLUP status into one view across all 14 LGUs.
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