With the launch of the Festival Village Awards Programme, Festival 1973 is set to reach its highest level of community involvement yet. Designed to touch “every nook and cranny” of Jamaica, the initiative aims to deepen rural participation and celebrate cultural pride through village-based competitions. Government leaders say the programme will add a powerful new dimension to nation-building and civic unity.

Festival Village Awards programme launched

Published Thursday, May 24, 1973

A special thrust for Festival 1973 in the form of a Festival Village Awards Programme has been launched. It is to be mounted jointly by the Jamaica Festival Commission, the Social Development Commission, and the Sugar Industry Labour Welfare Board.
A joint announcement of the launch was made on Tuesday by the Minister responsible for Festival, the Hon. Howard Cooke, Minister of Pensions and Social Security, and by the Hon. Dr. Douglas Manley, the Minister under whom the Community Development Agencies fall.

The idea behind the new project, which will embrace all the villages of the 13 parishes of the island, is to ensure the widest possible participation of the Jamaican people, reach “every nook and cranny,” and introduce into Festival an opportunity for total community cooperation and involvement not previously offered.

The plan is that the competition originates with the Jamaica Festival Commission as a Festival '73 project, but that the Commission will be assisted by the two community development agencies – the Jamaica Social Welfare Commission and the Sugar Industry Labour Welfare Board – both of which have experience and officers in these areas.

Speaking at a press conference held at the Courtleigh Manor Hotel to launch the Festival Village Programme, Mr. Cooke stated that he regarded Festival as a movement that reaches the soul of the people. The new programme, he said, was geared to add yet another dimension to Festival.

The Minister felt that the participation of rural Jamaica in Festival had been growing progressively over the years, and he believed this would reach a new peak this year with the introduction of the Festival Village idea.

He said that in keeping with the Festival Commission’s new policy of decentralization and identification with national goals – as well as greater collaboration with other agencies—it was very fitting that this year should herald this new thrust.

He indicated that the Festival Village Programme was aimed at adding a new dimension to the existing community development programmes. The Festival, he said, provided a vehicle for nation-building through the development of the island’s cultural life, and it cannot exist in isolation.

It was therefore important, he felt, that all aspects of village life – such as religious activities, attitude to cleanliness, pride in work, along with participation in Festival—should be continually reviewed, and that these varied areas of activity be considered in the selection of a Festival Village.

He noted that in recent times voluntary effort in Jamaica seemed to have lessened, but that fortunately, some of the happy voluntary spirit had been maintained in Festival activity, with the celebrations greater in rural areas than in urban centres.
In the final analysis, he said, he hoped the programme would create an atmosphere in which all persons would work together for the development of “the person” and the engendering of civic pride.

He stated that both the Hon. Dr. Manley and he hoped to inspire new coordination and a merging of efforts through this Festival Village movement.

The Minister congratulated the Festival Commission and the other organizations concerned with the introduction of the new competition and expressed confidence that the project would succeed. The wholehearted participation of the rural community in a scheme of this kind was a foregone conclusion, he felt.

The Hon. Dr. Manley, in his address, suggested that the occasion was yet another example of the fostering of inter-ministry joint programmes. He felt that this new programme would indeed bring all aspects of Festival to “every nook and cranny” of the country’s life and indicated that his Ministry would be providing organizational support for the Festival through its local departments in each area.

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