Chinese New Year 2009 Report

2009
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A Report on:

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Chinese New Year 2009 (Singapore)

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Your Name
University Name
8/23/2009



Executive summary

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This paper is about the great cultural festival “Chinese New Year” that is held every

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year in Singapore. The purpose of this paper was to assess information to a number of
sources, to review and then present a large amount of information in a logical format. It
discusses the origin of the “Chinese New Year”, type of the event, major stakeholders
of the event, and social and economic impact of the event. At the end of the paper

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certain recommendations are made in order to improve the performance and increase the
benefits of the event.
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Table of Contents

Executive summary .......................................................................................................... 2

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Introduction ...................................................................................................................... 4

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Type of the event: ..........................................................................................................4

Lantern Festival: ............................................................................................................5

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Social Impact of the Event: ............................................................................................6

Stakeholders of the Event: .............................................................................................6
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Economic Analysis of the Event:...................................................................................7

Religious sentiments: ................................................................................................ 7
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The income effect:..................................................................................................... 7
Focus of attention: ..................................................................................................... 8
Sponsors / Businesses ............................................................................................... 8
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Conclusion ........................................................................................................................ 9

Recommendations .......................................................................................................... 10
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References ...................................................................................................................... 11

Appendix ........................................................................................................................ 12

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Introduction

Singapore is a city where many colourful festivals and events held every year. One of
the biggest and popular festivals of Singapore is “Chinese New Year” that is held in the

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beginning of every year. As the name implies, it is a Chinese event. Chinese New Year
is not only celebrated by Chinese but it is also celebrated by people from other religion
and regions as well. It is celebrated on the very first day of the first month of the

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Chinese calendar. Every year the Government of Singapore gives two public holidays
so that every household do spring cleaning just before the time to welcome the New
Year. Chinese New Year comes with lot of cultural shows, interesting and colourful

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performances and flashy festivals. During the event Chinatown is decorated with
colourful light displays and becomes a wonderful place to watch. This big event has a
definitely social and economical impact on Singapore. “Chinese New Year” attracts
thousands of visitors and tourists every year. The event has so much of importance that
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it is shown live on many of the local television channels. It is a very big event and lot of
organizers have to be involved in order to make the event successful.

The discussion about the event is divided into four major sections in order to understand
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and critically evaluate the event – “Chinese New Year”.

1- Type of the event
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2- Social Impact of the event
3- Stakeholders of the event
4- The Economic analysis of the event

Type of the event:
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“Chinese New Year” is also known as “Lunar New Year / Spring Festival”. The event is
celebrated for fifteen days. The event ends with the “Lantern Festival”. The starting
point of the Chinese New Year Festival can be traced back thousands of years,
involving a chain of colourful legends and customs. The most famous one legend is
“Nian”, which is extremely cruel and wild beast that the olden people believed would
overwhelm people on New Year's Evening. In order to keep Nian away, red-paper
verses are pasted on doors, torches are lit, and firecrackers are set off throughout the

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night, because Nian is said to fear the colour red, the light of fire, and loud noises. Early
the next morning when feelings of achievement and replenishment fill the air at
successfully keeping Nian away, the most popular greeting heard is "gong xi fa cai", or
"congratulations.”

It starts on the first day of the Chinese calendar year. It is believed that on this day,

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various Gods go up to heaven to pay their respects and report on household affairs to
the Jade Emperor that is the supreme Taoist holy being according to the Chinese

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religion. The 20th of the Twelfth Moon was set aside for the annual housecleaning.
Every corner of the house must be swept and cleaned in preparation for the New Year.
Spring verses, written in black ink on large vertical scrolls of red paper, were put on the
walls or on the sides of the gate-ways. These verses, short poems written in Classical

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Chinese, were expressions of good wishes for the family in the coming year. In
addition, symbolic flowers and fruits were used to decorate the house, and colourful
New Year pictures were placed on the walls.
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A reunion dinner is held on New Year's Eve where members of the family, get together
for celebration. The New Year's Eve dinner is very large and traditionally includes
chicken. Fish is included, but not eaten up completely.
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Lantern Festival:

This New Year celebration ended in the Singapore on the 15th of the First Moon with
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the Lantern Festival. On the evening of 15th of full moon, people marched into the street
by carrying lamps into the streets just to participate in it. Young men would highlight
the parade with a dragon dance. This dragon is made of bamboo, silk, and paper, and
have ability to stretch more than hundred feet in length. The most attractive thing about
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this dragon is the bobbing and weaving of the dragon, and it forms a fitting finish to the
New Year festival.

There are many foods in Chinese culture associated with the Chinese New Year.
Although preferences vary from region to region, some examples include the following:

 “Fagao” is translated as "Prosperity Cake".
 “Yusheng” - a salad of raw fish and shredded crunchy vegetables (such as
carrots, jacamar, pickled ginger and pommel) in a plum sauce dressing.

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 Whole steamed fish
 Uncut noodles
 Baked goods with seeds

Social Impact of the Event:

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“Chinese New Year” is not only a celebration for Chinese in Malaysia and Singapore
but also from all over the world. Actual celebration starts on the day before the new

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year, where family members gather for a reunion dinner. A great number of Chinese
travelled back to Singapore this year to celebrate this festival with their families. The
reunion dinner is the major celebration and gathering for the family who have children
working outside the Singapore. On this year festival, many Taoists and Buddhist

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Chinese went to the temple together and prayed for the blessings of a good year.

On the New Year relatives and friends visit each other to offer their good wishes to each
other and give mandarin orange (which perceived as a sign of good luck and blessings
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for the New Year) during the visit. Numbers of gifts are exchanged between relatives
and friends, a tool of strengthening the relationships.

Today the life is so busy that nobody has time to sit and consume some time with family
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and friends. The event “Chinese New Year” is a fifteen days long event, providing a
platform to individuals to interact with relatives, socialize with other people especially
with the foreigners and the tourists, build networks, eliminate misunderstandings with
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each other, and to promote love and peace.

Stakeholders of the Event:
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The major stakeholders – the individuals / groups who were directly involved with the
event – of “Chinese New Year” are as follows;

 Event HQ International: it is a full service event and exhibition company that
has been active in the industry since 1986. Event HQ managed Chinese New
Year at China Town, Singapore. They had managed variety of booths, including
game stalls, amusement arcade; children play rides and as well as mega thrill
rides.

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 A+ Event Management: A+ Event Management also performed its services for
the “Chinese New Year 2009 – Singapore” festival. It involved in full live
events spectrum, exhibitions, and seminars.
 Chinese Community: The major proportion of people in Singapore is from the
Chinese Religion. That is one of the reasons why this festival held every year on

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such a big scale.
 Sponsors: Many sponsors have also taken part in the event. Major sponsors
includes: KGC (Khong Guaan Corporation), SABA, Singapore Connect,

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Contact Singapore, Prince of Peace, Five Star Golf etc.
 Tourists: The event, “Chinese New Year” held in Singapore every year attracts
many foreign tourists every year. Also, many local people who are living abroad


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and far away from their families come back to Singapore to meet their families
and have a “Reunion Dinner”.
Businesses: The businesses like lighting, catering, and party decorators,
flowering were very much involved through-out the event. The whole city is
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decorated with colourful lights paintings, and flowers.
 Singapore Police: The Singapore Police assisted through-out the event in order
to cope with security concerns. The traffic police have also a major role in
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managing traffic during the event.

Economic Analysis of the Event:
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The most important thing in this part is to see and analyze the demand and economic
impact of “Chinese New Year 2009 – Singapore”;

Religious sentiments: The probability of the fall in demand of the “Chinese New Year”
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festival is very low because Religious sentiments are attached with people. And the
Chinese community will never discontinue their celebrations of New Year regardless of
the economic situation.

The income effect: According to the economics, consumers tend to increase their
consumption when their income level rises up. It means if an individual’s earnings
increased from let’s say $1000 / month to $1500 / month than definitely his / her
consumption level will also grow. The relationship between income level and spending
is positive and directly proportional. As we know that currently the world is passing

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through recession phase and the income level of individuals are low as compared to the
previous years.

For this reason, in this year’s festival;

 Expensive restaurants were reported in Singapore a drop in bookings, while

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eateries were opted for cheaper meals. Businesses have also slashed prices in
order to draw more customers.
 Larger businesses in Singapore were also affected, with well-known

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restaurants, gift shops and supermarkets offering lower-priced packages.
 More families prepared home-cooked food instead of eating in restaurants.
 Reservations for the traditional New Year's Eve dinner were vigorous, but




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the business dipped after the first few days of festivities.
DDMA Market Research and Consulting estimated that Lunar New Year
consumption would decline five percent from 2008.
The top sales categories at Chinese New Year are branded fashion goods and
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clothes, digital products and entertainment but this year lowest sales were
recorded in these categories only due to the recession.
 Yip Wai Keong, who owns Guangzhou Waxed Meats in Singapore's
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Chinatown, Said "My sales have dropped 20-25 percent.... The economy is
bad, people are buying less," Waxed meat is the popular product during this
festival.
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Focus of attention: These types of huge events automatically focused the attention of
people all around the globe through the media (television, radian and the print media).

Sponsors / Businesses: Sponsors get benefited from this type of activity as huge
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number of people watches this event live on their television sets. It offers businesses the
opportunity to make money. It does not only offer benefit to tourist industry but other
businesses or industries as well like catering, flowering, or who are involved in the
production of event.

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Conclusion

“Chinese New Year” is one of the important and cultural event for the Chinese

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community. It is not only celebrated by the Chinese community, people from other
regions also come and takes part in the event to have some entertainment and fun. As
this event continues for fifteen days, people come and meet with each other; Chinese

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living abroad comes back to their towns and has reunion dinner with their families.
Besides its social impact, this event has also economic impact as well. Although this
year due to world recession, the event sales dropped down as compared to the previous

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year but these type of events do bring at least some kind of extra revenues and benefits
to the society. The stakeholders of the event, mainly were; Event HQ, A+ Event
Management Company, Chinese community, foreigners, and Sponsors etc.

After thoroughly studying and analyzing the social and economic impact of the event, it
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is concluded that the event “Chinese New Year” is of great fun and entertainment. It has
a very large amount of audience and therefore it is very demanding by the cultural
people, businesses, and the economy. Usually every year this event brings lot of
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revenues to the businesses, sponsors, and the economy. This year, due to worst financial
conditions of the world and individuals, sales of the event were not as much as the sales
of 2008 event, but the point is that it was only due to the financial crisis period. As soon
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as the crisis period over, the sales of event will again raise due to the income effect i.e.
Consumers tend to increase in spending as their income level goes up.
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Recommendations

In order to make this event more successful,

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 Government of Singapore should cut down the travelling expenses i.e. domestic
and as well as international travelling, so that more and more could afford and

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able to come on this event at Singapore.
 It is a very big event and more than one event management companies are
involved for the setup and organization of this event, therefore Government


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should implement proper system of checks and balances, and coordination
between these companies.
Due to recession some of the businesses are planning to shut down their
operations, Government should play its role here and uplift those businesses. By
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doing so, more and more businesses will take part in the event, helping the event
to be a successful one.
 Government should plan and present sponsorship packages in a way to attract
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international businesses so that more revenues could be captured.
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

References



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Victor Qu Jingzhon, (2006), THE BRIDGE: A JOURNAL OF THE INTER-
CULTURAL LITERARY CLUB, 2: 2-4.

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 O'Hagan, John W. (1992). The Wexford Opera Festival: A Case for Public
Funding? In: Ruth Towse and Abdul Khakee (eds.). Cultural Economics. Berlin:
Springer: 61-66.

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Frey, Bruno S. (1986). The Salzburg Festival – from the Economic Point of
View. Journal of Cultural Economics 10: 27-44.

Getz, Donald and Wendy Frisby (1988). Evaluating Management Effectiveness
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in Community-Run Festivals. Journal of Travel Research 27: 22-27.

 Michael Aquino, (Feb. 2009), Singapore Ushers In the Year of the Ox,
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http://goseasia.about.com/b/2009/01/20/singapore-ushers-in-the-year-of-the-
ox.htm, Accessed at 17/08/2009.
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 Economic crisis tames Year of the Ox celebrations in Asia, (2009),
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5hJ1TmqBfyPy3NighbeJ
VeXLuA8NA, Accessed at 19/08/2009.
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 Focus Singapore: Singapore Chinese New Year 2009,
http://www.focussingapore.com/singapore-upcoming-events/chinese-new-year-
2009.html, Accessed at 18/208/2009.

 SPF Media Releases: Traffic Arrangements for Chinese New Year Yuan Xiao
Jie Celebration (Feb 2009),
http://www.spf.gov.sg/mic/2009/090206_yuanxiao_hhk.htm, Accessed at
18/08/2009.

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Appendix

Here are some of the pictures of the “Chinese New Year 2009 – Singapore”:

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