Deepening the International Understanding of Korea:
Fermentation for Sustainability and Innovation

Korea’s image and the question of its sustainability
The question of Korea’s image and its withstanding of time is one that I would like to raise to start this proposal. Indeed, up until a few years ago the general image of Korea in my country was one made mostly of unfamiliarity. Mostly associated with North Korea in discussions, Korea’s image was mostly unknown. Yet, things have drastically changed in the past few years. Korea is now recognized as a power house when it comes to pop culture. Highly known for its K-wave, from dramas to pop music and beauty products, Korea has a very definite image in France. But while being shown as a cool, youthful, trendy and hip nation, I have also come across people being very critical of this image.

From being described as shallow, consumerist, or quite artificial, this image of Korea relying on the K-wave has also some down points: by relying on one single image, it risks to be essentialized to not only positives points but also negatives points. This single image also risks creating disenchantment upon any experience that does not perfectly align with the crafted ideal. Finally, it also risks one last thing: obsolescence after trending. Indeed, as Korea’s image and its immense international cultural success and recognition is rather new (or at least rather never-seen-before in terms of such rapid growth), the next step is to now explore how to maintain and anchor such a strongly present image, influence and attraction through time. For that, this essay aims to explore one way in which Korea could affirm a sustainable image abroad.

Sustainability as a global issue: meanings and implications
“Sustainability” is one big word in today’s world. Rather than overused, I think the overwhelming presence of this word goes to show just how central the matter of sustainability is and so, in all domains. The idea of sustainability relates to and represents the solution to most of the challenges we are facing in our globalized world. From all types of consumption (fashion, food, tourism, etc) to all types of development (economical, geographical, and so on) and even creation, in today’s world, all of those elements must answer to the sustainability imperative in order to prosper. In that sense, sustaining oneself is not only a matter of ecology, it is an overall approach to apply in order to withstand the passing of time. Thus, while sustainability is most often used in the contexts of safety and security relating to human development, I would argue that it is also a key directive point to have when it comes to a country’s culture and its image, especially abroad.

Sustainability on all level for Korea and its image: a matter of diversification
To me, sustainability is the goal and the mean for Korea’s image. In order to keep a visible and impactful presence internationally, Korea must capitalize on a diversity of its cultural aspects, especially ones involving a sustainability mindset on a developmental level. While the K-culture is very important, we must be careful to not reduce Korea to this image. Korea is multiple! One image is not enough to represent it and diversifying the images of Korea by decentralizing it from the K-experience could also offer the opportunity to not rely on this single aspect of the country's identity. In order to withstand the passing of time, in other words, sustain its image, one must be able to renew itself through innovation, creation, and adaptability.

Now those qualities are already something essential to Korea’s image, the only thing missing is more variety of domains in which they apply when it comes to Korea’s abroad representation. Creating an international image is also about bridging cultures, being able to showcase one’s culture by creating a space of sharing, one with a common ground where communication is possible. This is of course a challenge, how can one find commonness in the foreign, and how can it be done while preserving cultural integrity when it comes to representation? To me the answer to this would be lying in collaboration.

In order for Korea's image to sustain itself, establishing long-lasting connections through the image that is broadcasted abroad is necessary. On all levels, from policies to educational content and cultural/popular productions, it is useful to not only focus on exporting and showcasing one’s culture but also to create spaces of exchange for productive development. Plus, the idea of collaboration and exchanges could counterattack the risk of disillusion evoked before. By involving the concerned communities in the representation of their image abroad, it could fill in the gap of representation vs. reality by not only showcasing one’s culture (=one-way street) but by initiating creative dialogues (=multidirectional approach to living heritages).

Fermentation as a way of diversification and as a space of collaboration for Korea
Yet, while all this theory might sound great, it still lacks great practicality. Diversification of images and cultural exchange for sustainability might be a useful approach but it does not fully answer the real question asked at first in this essay in a concrete way: How could this be done? Upon pondering on a concrete proposal to apply my theories to, I came across a food documentary on TV. This very famous French cuisine chef was visiting East Asia and was having a meal with a soy sauce master. After touring the soy farm and explaining the fermentation process, the soy sauce craftman showed him something that at first would be considered a crime in my country: putting soy sauce in wine. Just like me the French chef was ready to claim blasphemy upon such a sighting. Yet, as he tasted the now soy sauce-mixed red wine, something surprising happened: it was good. The rounded-tasting fermented soy sauce with the strong wine perfected its taste and made a delicious mix by balancing, complementing, and exploring different tastes of fermentation. This is when it hit me.

Upon my one year of living in Korea I was lucky to taste a great variety of fermented drinks and foods from all regions of the country, yet while kimchi is of course a landmark for Korea’s image abroad, my experience as well as the chef experience was one that still remained totally unexplored in today's representation of Korea internationally. Whether it is for alcoholic drinks or foods, fermentation processes are a very important part of Korean culture as well as it is present, if not most often central, in a lot of other cultures. Here is the cultural bridge! Plus fermented foods has now been a subject of international collaboration and development concerns for quite some time. Whether it is in relation to public health, food security, or culture, fermented foods and fermentation processes are at the center of global discussions and could be a good way of diversifying Korea’s images by showing a new aspect of it, and one that is also in accordance with current matters. If I were to apply this idea to my country for example, the exploration of fermented foods could be a very fruitful exchange that would have a long lasting effect on Korea’s image. Culinary students' exchanges could be developed around learning different techniques of fermentation. Popular contents and materials linking common points and experimenting with elements of fermentation and their products could be created (from cocktails to gut-health recipes, fermentation covers it all). 

Especially since both France and Korea have a deeply-rooted food culture which is also reflected in the great presence of food-related contents on TV shows and popular medias. An overall promotion of creative and collaborative spaces related to fermented foods (from classes, events, recipe books, sns contents, etc) could be a great way to apply this idea of diversification in only domains but also level-wise. From popular culture presence to the international stage, to food sustainability and health concerns on local and global levels, fermented foods as a cultural asset to promote Korea does not limit itself to one aspect. It is a transversal proposal to the modern world and its issues. As today’s world and its questions cannot be contained in one specific area, we must showcase a complexified approach that answers to challenges just as complex. Fermented foods and the image of Korea it could contribute to create is one in line with a mindset of sustainability in theory AND practice. It is about sustaining one’s image through time through the practice of developmental strategies that are also sustainable in their content as well as their form.

In the end, food is one of the most central things which reunites people and cultures, and for the development and sustainability of Korea’s image abroad, I propose fermented foods as an element to be more explored. In line with global trends and policies, fermented foods and processes have the potential to greatly participate in establishing a long lasting presence and image of Korea through long lasting international collaboration and exchanges that are anchored on multiple levels of actions.

[Grand Prize]
Renard Angele
(Country of Activity : France)