The Role of Cultural Events in Urban Tourism Economy Development with an Emphasis on LQ Model

Ancient cities are symbols of cultural and historical diversities and thus should be treated as places that possess valuable and important attractions for tourism. Indeed the cultural indicators are one of the factors in attracting tourists to cities. Therefore when a city is ready to hold festivals and fairs، it can facilitate and attracts revenues and to thrive the economy. Therefore urban tourism can be the cornerstone of a city’s economic، social and cultural development. The Tehran International Book Fair is considered to be world’s one of the most credited book exhibitions. The present research aims to study the economic effects of Tehran International Book Fair on urban tourism opportunities. The present research is an applied case and uses descriptive and analytical methods to calculate the multiplier effect and coefficient. The necessary data is gathered through field methods and questionnaires، as well as through interviews in order to obtain the necessary information about the cost of accommodation in the city of Tehran. The questionnaires given to tourists contained topics such as individual characteristics of tourists، the tourism economy and opportunities، motivations and gravity، time and place of accommodation، transportation mode، behavior of visitors and so on. The research population are the Tehran International Book Fair visitors in 2012; it was estimated through Cochran method that about five million people visited the fair in that year. The sample size was about 500 people by Cochran method. The sampling method was random one and the samples selected from visitors that tripped to Tehran from another cities and provinces after getting permission from the Security Office of the Tehran international Book Fair. The calculating multiplier effect requires having a multiplier effect in each of the sub-sectors of tourism، including transportation، hotels، restaurants، entertainment centers، etc. Discussion and The result of this research indicates that the book fair can be made use of as an economic opportunity and phenomenon for tourism development. Some of the most important economic effects of this even are its potentials for entrepreneurship and creation of income for people who are in the service sector. The multiplier effect، according to research data، is about 1/81 to 0/875. Also، the maximum multiplier effect for all categories is calculated to be 1/66 and 0/875 at least. In general، it can be said that the multiplier effect in tourism is almost close to the level of the multiplier effect and is no longer the world''s tourist destinations and countries and cities، or at least at the level of the world average. This means that tourism in the city of Tehran because of Tehran International Book Fair can be an effective and reasonable multiplier effect in the field of urban economy development. The economic benefits of tourism are one of the factors of urban tourism development. The Tehran international book fair is as one of the most important of international exhibitions in Iran and western Asian region that will have been the role an economic opportunity for urban tourism. Every year several million visitors coming to this city that have some effects in the field of employment، income، dynamics in the productive economic flows، current money bringer and strengthen the culture. The important finding is that this fair not only makes a profit for the economic activities، but also affects the investment profitability and economic flow to play a multiplier effect. The Tehran International Book Fair through attract several million visitors affects urban economy directly and indirectly and many of the urban tourism parts are fed up by these opportunities. Without a doubt، one of the most important of economic effects the book fair is creation of employment and thus creation of income for citizens engaged in the service sector.