Potential New Stakes in the Philippines

With 78 stakes and 86 districts, the Philippines has the largest membership out of any country in the Eastern Hemisphere. The number of stakes in the country has stayed between 75 and 83 for the past four or five years while the number of districts continues to increase. Recently the Church has launched a new meetinghouse locator that can be viewed at beta.maps.lds.org . This new locator has helped me find the location of congregations in the Philippines much more easily than with the old meetinghouse locator. One can view any place in the world and search for a congregation. I have been able to view maps available at cumorah.com which provide data for Church units five or six years ago and then compare with current data on Church units in the Philippines and other countries in the world. This is one of the tools I use to make predictions on likely new stakes and districts.

You may ask why there are so many districts in the Philippines and one of the big reasons why is because mobility in the Philippines is not easy. This is because of the 100s of islands which constitute the Philippines along with the poverty of the people and lack of infrastructure. Other reasons include inactivity and the large numbers of new members.

That being said, I will provide a list of all the districts in the Philippines which have enough branches to mature into a stake. I will then give a list of likely districts to become stakes along with the number of branches in each of these districts. It is also likely that any of these districts could be divided into two districts as opposed to maturing into a stake. As for large stakes likely to split, the only one I can find is in Butuan.

Districts with at least five branches

• Agoo
• Aguilar
• Alaminos
• Alicia
• Aparri
• Bambang
• Biliran
• Bongabon
• Borongan
• Bulan
• Burgos
• Camiling East
• Camiling West
• Catanduanes
• Dipolog
• Dumaguete
• Escalante
• Gingoog
• Guimba
• Iba
• Kidapawan
• La Carlota
• Ligao
• Maasin
• Malaybalay
• Marbel
• Mati
• Mindoro Oriental
• Naic
• Narra
• Olongapo
• Orion
• Pagadian
• Pamplona
• Paniqui
• Placer
• Sagay
• San Antonio
• San Carlos
• San Gabriel
• San Jose del Monte
• Santa Cruz Marinduque
• Santa Cruz
• Siniloan
• Sipalay
• Solano
• Sorsogon
• Surigao
• Tagbilaran
• Tagum
• Toledo

Districts most likely to become stakes

• Alicia - 8
• Camiling (East and West) - 11
• Dipolog - 7
  
• Dumaguete - 7
  
• Escalante - 8
  
• Gingoog - 7
  
• Guimba - 7
  
• Malaybalay - 7
  
• Paniqui - 7
  
• Placer - 7
• Sagay - 6
• Santa Cruz Marinduque - 5
• Santa Cruz - 7
• Siniloan - 6
• Surigao - 5
• Tagbilaran - 8
• Tagum - 6
• Toledo - 8
• Tolosa - 7