Arief Yahya (born 2 April 1961 in Banyuwangi) is the former Minister of Tourism of Indonesia between 2014 and 2019 in the Working Cabinet of President Joko Widodo.

Yahya was born in Banyuwangi, East Java on 2 March 1961, his father a merchant while her mother was a stay-at-home parent.

At the age of 18, he was admitted to the Bandung Institute of Technology to study electrical engineering.

He continued to earn his doctorate at Padjadjaran University, graduating with a business management degree in 2014.

There, he gradually rose up the corporate ranks, at points becoming head of a local office, a regional division, then becoming a director of enterprise and wholesale.