Organzation and Development of Gastronomic Tourism Business in the CALABARZON Region: Basis for a Proposed Strategic Management Intervention

This study focused on gastronomic tourism in terms of organization and development as aspects in Region IV-A CALABARZON to develop a strategic management intervention program. Specifically, it identified the business demography of gastronomic tourism business in the region; their business organization in terms of motivation, environment, capacity, and performance and their level of practice in developing gastronomic business in terms of structure, management attitude, operations systems, ethics ad values of managers, and organization climate. The study is a descriptive research which employed the mixed method. A survey questionnaire was used as primary instrument for the quantitative approach while interview guide and audio-video recording were utilized for the qualitative approach. Frequency, weighted mean, t-test, and ANOVA were used as statistical treatments. Results revealed that gastronomic business in the CALABARZON region were mostly sole proprietorship, large and mature business where investment capital were used. Common gastronomic products include bulalo, crispy data, kare-kare, pork sisig, sinugno, grilled tilapia, baby back rib, tuna belly, sinigang, na hipon/swahe/sugpo, pandit hab-hab/ Lucban, special halo-halo, champ, spaghetti and other pizza, kulawong puso ng saging, Imus and Lucban longanisa, kapeng barako, dark mocha and fresh buco. They have healthy organizational characteristics based on performances appraisal, organizational motivation, external environment, and management approach. They are often practiced by restaurants having good organization structure, management attitude, operations systems, mission, vision and goal, ethics and values of managers, and organisational climate. They are also using interventions like confrontation meeting, coaching and counselling, and team building.