DREAM Festival launched in 2010 and has existed for 11 years, having been organised annually by a volunteer committee, but with COVID-19 at full-force last year it was cancelled.

Dubbo mayor Stephen Lawrence said DRC would be working with the volunteer committee for the continuation of annual 10-day community festival.

"With the assistance of Dubbo Regional Council the DREAM Festival will be able to run at a larger scale and will be bigger and better than ever before," he said.

The festival will highlight some of the regions best musicians and performers, with the lantern parade and workshops going ahead and a new partnership with Taronga Western Plains Zoo for Zoocoustic - an afternoon of acoustic sounds at the zoo.

Cr Lawrence said the event was a huge economic benefit to the region, with more than 20,000 people in attendance annually, 5,000 of which come from out of outside the region.

There will be applicable COVID-19 public health regulations in place, but Cr Lawrence said the festival would be of no higher risk then what we already face.

"We continue to have a high amount of visitors to our region every weekend, and that's a good thing, but we all need to continue to do the right thing," he said.

"The reality is, every weekend in Dubbo we have a huge amount of tourists. We have had record numbers in terms of bookings in recent times, so people understand, that does bring with it small risks that have to be carefully managed.

The COVID-19 scare we recently had with the Victorian couple, in my view, you have to look to the positives, it was a wake up call that we have to continue to do our bit in terms of checking into venues and complying with measures."

Macquarie Credit Union remains the major sponsor. DREAM Festival will run from October 14 to 24.

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