Two hundred miles north of Manila, on the island of Luzon in the Philippines, terraced rice paddies rise like giant stairs from the valley floor to an altitude of 5,000 feet along the steep contours of the Cordillera mountain range.

With the slopes attaining grades of 70 degrees, one might wonder how motorized equipment to cut and level the terraces was moved up the mountainside. It wasn’t.

The Rice Terraces of the Philippine Cordilleras were painstakingly carved from the harsh terrain by Ifugao tribes people using primitive tools and bare hands more than 2,000 years ago.

The oldest mountain tribe in the area, the Ifugao created and farmed the terraces to grow rice for their families. They incorporated a gravity-fed irrigation system, utilizing water from aquifers in the forests 2,000 feet above.

Although highland cultivation of rice is practiced throughout Asia, the Cordillera terraces are the most extensive and unique. They cloak the highest peaks of five provinces: Abra, Benguet, Ifugao, Kalinga-Apayao, and Mountain. In all, they span 49,400 acres, and if laid end to end, they would stretch 13,900 miles (halfway around Earth).

The Rice Terraces of the Philippine Cordilleras were listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1996 under the cultural landscapes category. Cultural landscapes are defined as sites of significant global value that demonstrate the interaction of man and nature.

Due to the diligence of Cordilleras tribes people, who have passed their rice paddies to each family’s oldest son from generation to generation, the terraces have survived into the 21st century. Their importance as a food source might have faded, but their sheer beauty has made them a popular tourist attraction.

Prime destination of most visitors is the town of Banaue, which provides a spectacular overview of the terraces. Traveling around the area involves walking up and down mountain trails that can be narrow and slippery, but several small villages are worth the effort.

For example, in Tam-An, people still practice traditional crafts, such as weaving rattan headbands decorated with chicken feathers and making "good luck" necklaces from snake bones and wild boar teeth.

Poitan, situated in the heart of the terraces, surrounded by magnificent scenery, specializes in carving wooden objects such as bowls and Bulul figures. Bululs are sacred rice gods, carved as a male and female pair and ceremonially bathed in animal blood. Placed outside the village rice storehouse, they are said to both protect and miraculously increase the contents.

Another tourist destination in the Cordilleras is the town of Sagada, accessible only by dirt road. It attracts mainly backpackers interested in seeing the underground caves and mountain tribe coffins hung on limestone cliffs.

An image of the terraces embossed on Philippine peso bills leaves little doubt that the country considers them a national treasure. Yet sadly, the existence of the majestic terraces is being threatened in a number of ways.

A major earthquake in 1990 altered the course of Cordilleras mountain streams. This caused some areas formerly covered with thick upland forests to become denuded, eroding the soil. The situation was exacerbated by forest fires. With forests no longer protecting watersheds, irrigation became less efficient.

Conflicts erupted over water rights. Several lives were lost in a dispute between the villages of Fidelisan and Dalican, after the latter constructed a dam to divert water into its irrigation canals. A compromise was reached in April 2005, when Dalican authorities agreed to recognize Fidelisan’s ownership of the springs that feed the stream in exchange for a guaranteed share of the water.

In addition, the terraces require constant maintenance. However, younger generations in the Cordilleras, which is among the poorest regions of the Philippines, don’t feel the need to farm rice, earning money instead as tour guides or mini bus drivers. So the terraces increasingly are left untilled and unweeded, and some people are even building shelters on them.

Damage to the cultural landscape by this combination of neglect and environmental degradation has been so rapid that UNESCO has relegated the Rice Terraces of the Philippine Cordilleras to its list of "world heritage in danger." The organization has warned that this most extraordinary system of terracing must be restored within a decade or its "world heritage value may be lost."

UNESCO mandated Teodoro Baguilat, governor of Ifugao, to manage the terraces until a permanent foundation was established to oversee their redevelopment. He revised an earlier $37 million plan to rehabilitate the region.

The plan covers restoring watersheds and improving irrigation, but it also includes tapping new energy sources, providing a better transportation infrastructure, exploiting tourism potential and uplifting the livelihood of the local people. Perhaps more importantly, it aims at protecting the culture and the environment.

Funding is coming from UNESCO, the Philippine government and "investment matching expeditions," where potential donors are taken to the terraces to identify first-hand which restoration component they wish to "invest" in.

Although he has now left the governor’s office, Baguilat remains active in the movement to rehabilitate the terraces, consulting with local communities to determine their needs and to engender their support. "Indeed, the people themselves are beginning to realize that they may have taken the rice terraces for granted," he says.

He adds that involvement of local communities is essential because "what we want to restore is the total cultural landscape. Not just the rice terraces but almost everything that goes with them, like the rituals that have been passed down by generations."

There are 12 annual Ifugao rituals associated with rice production that had not been performed for decades before Baguilat began implementing the plan. They now are being reintroduced.

"The physical erosion of the terraces is the tangible effect, but what also is significant is the erosion of the cultural values," says Baguilat.