THE ROLE OF INDONESIA’S GOVERNMENT IN CONDUCTING INDONESIA’S GASTRODIPLOMACY THROUGH TOURISM PROMOTION TO SAUDI ARABIA (2015-2018)

Abstract

As part of government institutions, the Ministry of Tourism has an important role to assist the President in running the government, especially in the tourism sector. One of the functions and duties of the Ministry of Tourism is to promote tourism abroad, in this study is to Saudi Arabia. In conducting tourism promotion activities, one of the media that can be used is traditional Indonesian food and drinks which are part of a culture. The utilization of food and drink as a medium for tourism promotion can be referred to as gastrodiplomacy. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to determine the role of the Indonesian government, especially the Ministry of Tourism in conducting gastrodiplomacy through tourism promotion to Saudi Arabia by knowing the types of Indonesian traditional foods and drinks brought by the government to Saudi Arabia. Although in the practice, Indonesia does not yet have a clear policy that governing about gastrodiplomacy as one of Indonesia's diplomacy strategies. While the benefit and usefulness of this research is to provide deeper knowledge that diplomacy between countries can be done simply through food. Also, this study intends to add insight against gastrodiplomacy Indonesia in the science of international relations, due to gastrodiplomacy is new knowledge, especially for gastrodiplomacy Indonesia. The method used in this research is qualitative research method. The data collection in this study is using a literature study collected based on primary data obtained from the Ministry of Tourism and secondary data derived from books, journals, articles and so on. This research shows that the Ministry of Tourism has carried out gastrodiplomacy practices in tourism promotion activities to Saudi Arabia by using Indonesian traditional food and drinks as a promotional tool.