Impact of Festival in the economy of Tarlac

Chapter 1 : Problem and Its Background

Introduction:
Festivals and special events are a popular attraction throughout the world. Many
communities rely on events to bring residents and visitors together to celebrate the community
around them. Planning for festivals and special events involves many planning hours to ensure
the most beneficial amenities and attractions are being provided for attendees. Communities
experience a range of benefits from special events and festivals. These benefits include building
social cohesion, providing a specific time and place for families and friends to show their
commitments to the area, to provide public goods beyond entertainment, and to provide a
socially acceptable area for public actions. A community will also experience a number of
economic benefits from special events and festivals. These benefits can include looking at the
number of participants that attend the event and the estimated dollar value per event. These
benefits help to determine the overall economic impact of the event.
In the recent decades, the waves of globalization have swept every corner of the country,
which gives rise to the increasing competition between different cities in order to survive or
stand out in such big climate. Thus, the ideas of city marketing and urban regeneration have
emerged as a major concern for the policy makers. Festivals and events are an essential part of
city life. They have a function of providing a good vehicle to strengthen a city in competition.
Given this function, more and more cities hold festivals and events with the aim of improving the
cities images, attracting visitors and investment as well as stimulating urban development and
boosting local economy as a whole.
Tarlac is the most multicultural of the Central Luzon provinces. A mixture of four district
groups, the Pampangos, Ilocanos, Pangasinenses, and Tagalogs, share life in the province. Tarlac
is best known for its fine foods and vast sugar and rice plantations. That it has fine cooking to
offer is due largely to the fact that it is the melting pot of Central Luzon. It offers some of the
best cuisines from the places of ancestry of its settlers, the provinces of Bulacan, Nueva Ecija,
Zambales, Pangasinan, and the Ilocos Region. Historical sites, fine food, vast plantations, a

beautifully landscaped golf course, and so many other attractions all these make the province
of Tarlac one of the best of the places to visit in Central Luzon.

By performing a comprehensive analysis of research study and interview, the main

finding is that the city of Tarlac is enhanced by hosting Melting Pot festival. The methods of
induction and deduction are applied to the research process, drawing the conclusion that a
successful city festival has a function of promoting the city image. Several recommendations and
implications will be outlined for future research and the cultural sector, with a hope of this
research providing an enlightenment of the importance of using festivals and events as a means
of culture-led strategies in urban planning and city development.
The research aims at providing a platform for innovative theoretical and practical studies
on the relationship of festivals, events and the city image. The main objective of the research is
to see in which ways do the festivals and events boost the city image of Talac. The central
research questions of the thesis are: whether and to what extent was the city image of Tarlac
enhanced through Melting Pot Festival and other events that may be implement in the future
development? Based on the former one, followed by another question: How can City
governance of Tarlac improve the city image by hosting this kind of festivals and events?

Objective of the Study:

Festivals and special events lead to many benefits within the host community. As stated
earlier, these benefits include building social cohesion, providing a sense of place, providing
public goods beyond entertainment, and providing a socially acceptable area for public actions.
Values and beliefs can vary between people within a community based on how their experiences
have influenced them. Communitybased festivals focus on economic benefits for host
communities and the effects of the tourism promotion. These festivals provide the opportunity
for residents and visitors to collectively experience an event that is distinct from everyday life.
These values, interests, and aspirations are influenced by a persons space and environment,
which leads to a sense of community that influences how the community celebrates, that affects
the communitys wellbeing and in turn informs the environment in which individuals and
groups define their values and beliefs. Better understanding how people are influenced can help a
community understand which type of festival is best. Three major elements can help to determine
a festival type: the destination or place, the people who reside in the location, and the visitors
that are attracted to the location or festival. When a location is better understood a more efficient
festival can be created. The host community can also encourage the festival to enhance or
preserve local culture and history.
The main aims and objectives of this festival are listed as follows:

To advocate the city image of Tarlac;

To play a leading role in developing the citys reputation;
To maximize the opportunity to cater for increased tourist numbers to the city of Tarlac;
To encourage collaboration, networking, information and knowledge sharing;
To promote friendships and mutual communication;
To celebrate cultural diversity;
To assist in the development of a network of community and local events;
To provide the opportunity to encourage local artists to showcase their work at festivals

and events.
To attract foreign investment;

Statement of the Problem:

Understanding the economic impacts of annual community festivals in Tarlac is
necessary for event coordinators to understand the reasons why a festival is important to their
community and surrounding areas. This information allows festival planners to show community
members the financial impacts these events have on a variety of stakeholders. Sponsors also need
to know how their donations contribute towards a successful event, In order to make a strategic
option to enhance the volume of tourism in our country down to our city.
Research Question:
1. What are the economic impacts of the Melting Pot Festival in the City of Tarlac?
1.1 Age
1.2 Gender
1.3 Occupation
2. Why are these economic impacts important to the host community (Tarlac City)?
3. How long do these impacts last in the community?
3.1 Short-term
3.2 Long-term
3.3 How many years it may stay
4. Do different lengths of festivals lead to different economic impacts within the
community?
4.1 Cost affectivity
4.2 Availability
4.3 Efficiency
5. Do surrounding communities benefit from similar economic impacts as the host
community?

Hypothesis:

The current hypothesis is that many societies are now multicultural and have the opportunity to
enrich the lives of many members of that particular society. Also, there is a big impact of urban
life style in other life style in terms of:
a. Tradition and Culture
b. Civil Status
c. Occupation
Hence, are becoming more populated and this can cause many stressors in a persons life. The
special events and festivals have the potential to provide a location for society members to come
together and share identities and places of significance. If run correctly, these festivals have the
potential to generate extra income for the host community. The event should be sure to share the
communitys story and contribute to the unique image. This can be done by ensuring local talent
is featured and local businesses are used as partners for the event.

Importance of the Study:

This particular study will focus on the economic impact of annual community festivals,
specifically examined will be the Melting Pot Festival in City of Tarlac. Reviewing the economic
impact of the annual event will display the economic effects the event has on Festival. Areas of
research to be highlighted include examining the number of participants to attend the event and
how the amount spent throughout the event will affect the increase in sales tax revenue. Festival
planners will benefit from this data by learning how to make future events financially beneficial
to the community. This data can also provide a defense on why a community festival would be
important for a particular area and also to market our city to our beloved tourist. Many individual
may benefit to this event due to job orders and opportunities in different ways like putting up
small business during the events.

Scope and Delimitation

Definition of Terms:
Festival and events -They refer to two kinds of definitions in broad and narrow sense
respectively. From the western point of view, festivals and events usually go hand in hand. And
in this paper, I would like to put the festivals and events together as a whole to research to
demonstrate the impact to economy in Tarlac.
In dictionary, festivals are defined as follows:
An occasion for feasting or celebration, especially a day or time of religious significance
that recurs at regular intervals.
An often regularly recurring program of cultural performances, exhibitions, or
competitions.
Revelry; conviviality.
Economic Impact - is one of the most important factors that could be directly measured in terms
of investment or expenditure when it comes in Festivals and events. Economic analysis of
events provides one aspect of why events are held and the effects that they have on a region.
However, while many of the economic impacts of events are quite tangible many of the social
are not.