Food Tourism as a Current Trend in Modern Culture

The purpose of the article is to analyse the formation and development of food tourism in the context of the sociocultural vector of understanding tourism concepts. The research methodology is based on applying a system-structural approach focused on the study of tourism as a holistic sociocultural phenomenon. The scientific novelty is that for the first time, the essence of food tourism is considered in the sociocultural aspect, which gives grounds to define it as a significant reagent for influencing social processes. Conclusions. It is emphasised that food tourism is a reasonably young direction, which is actively developing. Still, even today, many people prefer to learn about the traditions and customs of another country through tasting ethnic dishes and drinks. Therefore, given that the gastronomic tradition is an ever-evolving process, the challenge for professionals is to incorporate innovation, update and adapt their offerings to the needs of the new consumer culture. World development trends of food tourism suggest a sustainable movement that allows travellers to interact with local communities and gain fresh experiences on travel. Businesses need to develop updated promotion strategies under competitive expansion for the users’ attention and the emergence of new technologies. Ukraine undoubtedly has the potential to increase the international competitiveness of the tourism industry, including through increased multiculturalism of tourist flows (including more and more people from developing countries), growing demand for new tourist destinations, ecotourism, diversity of cultural and natural landscape. The article draws attention to the need to clarify precise vectors of gastronomic tourism in the country, attract the best world experience, develop appropriate state support for tourist destinations, travel agencies and other stakeholders, as well as study the sociocultural qualities of tourism in the context of social migration and dialectical interaction of global processes regionalisation