Cambodia: Tourism capacity statistics by region for 2020 are released

• May 19, 2021

The office of Prime-Minister Hun Sen has tweeted a report from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation detailing tourism capacity levels by region for 2020.

The areas with the highest level of infrastructure for tourism were in order: Phnom Penh, Siem Reap, Sihanoukville, Kampot and Battambang.

Nationally there were 1,028 hotels catering to tourists in 2020.  The hotels provide 44,428 rooms and employed 35,561 people. Phnom Penh accounted for just over a third of the hotel jobs in the country.

The report cited that there were more guesthouses in the country than hotels, although they offered fewer rooms. A total of 2,755 guesthouses with 35,791 rooms employed 10,927 staff in 2020. Phnom Penh had the largest number of guesthouses at 812. Kampot, which is popular with backpackers, was next with 308 guesthouses.

Restaurants offering rooms totalled 3,359 establishments. They accounted for 185,258 rooms and employ 33,661 people.

The nation had a 2020 total of 15,738 hotels, guesthouses and restaurants that provide accommodation.  The facilities offer 265,477 rooms and directly employed 80,139 people last year.

A graph by the Ministry of Tourism details a city-by-city breakdown of accommodation types and capacity for 2020 in the Kingdom. Supplied

Tourism is considered one of the four pillars of the Cambodian economy. The country attracted 6.6 million international visitors during 2019, earning a gross revenue of $4.9 billion, which accounted for almost 13 percent of the country’s gross domestic product.

During 2020, Cambodia received only 1.31 million foreign visitors, a fall of around 80 percent compared with 2019. This drop exceeded the global decline in international arrivals in all countries, which stood at 74 percent.

Prior to the pandemic the Ministry of Tourism had predicted tourism numbers in the Kingdom to increase to 28 million by 2028. This would necessitate adding at least 100,000 extra hotel rooms throughout the country, specifically in major tourist hotspots such as Phnom Penh, Siem Reap and Sihanoukville, as well as an overall improvement in tourism infrastructure.

This includes the Siem Reap New International Airport, which is slated to open in 2023. By 2030 it is planned that the new airport will have a capacity to receive 10 million arrivals per year, up from 5 million at the current site.

Source: https://www.khmertimeskh.com/50858908/tourism-capacity-statistics-by-region-for-2020-are-released/