THE CONDUCT OF PERU’S GASTRODIPLOMACY THROUGH THE “PERÚ MUCHO GUSTO” CAMPAIGN TOWARD THE UNITED STATES (2012-2019)

Abstract

The gastronomic boom that Peru experienced has led Peru to be awarded as World’s Leading Culinary Destination by World Travel Awards for eight consecutive years, from 2012 until 2019. The gastronomic effort was motivated by Peru’s strong commitment to rebuild Peru’s image abroad through its national cuisine due to the terrorist attacks and crises that the country experienced years ago. Aware that the nation has outstanding taste in its national cuisine owing to its fusion of culture, Peru began to build their nation branding abroad through gastrodiplomacy. The government together with some Peruvian chefs who pioneered Peru's gastronomic boom, then launched a campaign called “Perú Mucho Gusto” to promote Peruvian cuisine and Peru’s culinary destinations. This thesis aims to examine the conduct of Peru’s gastrodiplomacy through the Perú Mucho Gusto campaign toward the United States from 2012 until 2019, highlighting the roles and actions taken by Peruvian state actors and non-state actors in their gastrodiplomacy activities. This thesis uses the qualitative research method in the making as it is considered to be the most suitable to

analyze and explain the gastrodiplomacy efforts Peruvian government and Peru’s non- state actors have been doing in the US, which are obtained from e-books, journals,

theses, government documents, articles, reports, news, websites, official government websites, and official organization websites. The main theories used to analyze this case are public diplomacy, gastrodiplomacy, and nation branding since those theories are correlated with the topic discussed in this thesis; and the author also uses the planning communication strategy based on Juyan Zhang to analyze and break down the Perú Mucho Gusto campaign strategy and implementation in more detail. The result of this research shows that the awareness and popularity of Peruvian cuisine among the US public are rising due to the high demand for Peruvian restaurants opening in the US, and dozens of famous local media publications and food enthusiast testimonies on Peruvian cuisine and Peru as a culinary destination country; the raising interest of American tourists to visit Peru with its cuisine as their motivation; and the positive impacts of Peru’s gastrodiplomacy in the US to Peru’s economic growth, especially in trade (export- import of the food supply chain), tourism, and employment.