TERRITORIAL BRANDING AS A PROMOTION TOOL FOR GASTRONOMY TOURISM AND TERRITORY DEVELOPMENT

In modern society, positioning of any region is a key issue of the territory development and a basic element of attracting investors. In this regard, creating a territory image and promotion of its brand is important part of the territory development and competitiveness in an effort to attract potential entrepreneurs and tourists. Building a successful tourist image has an informational and emotional-psychological impact on tourists, contributing to a positive image of the region. Within the framework of this article, the essential characteristics and comparative analysis of the terms: “image”, “brand”, “territory branding” were determined. In addition, a concept of “gastronomy brand” was analyzed as an independent form of a territory promoting. The goal of the research is to study gastronomy tourism as a socio-cultural form, a tool for territory branding. This article highlights the research of territorial branding in the aspect of gastronomy tourism and promoting the Far Eastern cuisine, as well as the formation of a structural model of a territorial brand. The work is based on the axiological structural-functional methods, methods of analysis, as well as deduction, classification and comparison. The scientific novelty of the research lies in the definition of the following concepts: gastronomy brand, territorial brand and the territorial image, highlighting the fundamental difference between the concepts of “territorial image” and “territorial brand”. The authors also examined the structural model of the territorial brand and consider the factors of the “Far Eastern cuisine” brand formation.