Assessment of Latacunga’s tourism carrying capacity during the Mama Negra Festival

Abstract

The Mama Negra Festival is a cultural expression of Latacunga that attracts a concentrated flow of attendees and places demands on local tourism services. This study aimed to assess the documented conditions of tourist reception capacity during the festival, distinguishing reported attendance from actually available operational capacity. A descriptive, non-experimental documentary study was conducted using municipal reports, tourism planning documents, public inventories, and academic literature. The municipal government estimated approximately 102,000 attendees in November 2024, an average expenditure of USD 35 per person, and economic activity of about USD 3,584,000. As historical context, Latacunga's tourism plan recorded 42 accommodation establishments, 692 rooms, and 1,108 lodging places as of March 5, 2020; it also listed 97 food-service establishments with 4,529 seats. These figures cannot be compared directly because they refer to different periods, units, and populations. No integrated, event-specific data on accommodation occupancy, daily availability, transport flows, safety, accessibility, and visitor services were available to establish a reliable maximum capacity threshold. The evidence thus provides a partial description of tourism demand and supply, but does not demonstrate either sufficiency or saturation. An operational monitoring framework based on time slots and service dimensions is proposed for future assessments.