From January to April this year, Cambodia welcomed a total of 82,839 international tourists, down 93 per cent from 1,160,067 over the same period last year.
Thailand ranked first for tourist arrivals by country of origin at 41,794, followed by China (25,986), Vietnam (2,993) and Indonesia (2,933), according to the latest data from the Ministry of Tourism.
Other countries and territories representing a significant share of arrivals were South Korea, Taiwan, the US, Malaysia, Japan and France.
Separately, Angkor Enterprise, which manages ticket sales at Angkor Archaeological Park, said it had generated $197,208 in the first five months of this year, down 98.91 per cent from the same period last year.
On April 1, Prime Minister Hun Sen formally approved a 2021-2025 three-phased national tourism roadmap and a 2021-2035 Siem Reap provincial tourism development master plan to navigate the sector’s emergence from the Covid-19 pandemic and support its recovery.
A tourism ministry report revealed that 1.31 million international tourists visited Cambodia in 2020, down 80.2 per cent from 6.61 million in 2019, while Cambodian travellers made about nine million trips to domestic destinations, a year-on-year decrease of 20 per cent.
Last year’s decline in international tourist arrivals cost the Cambodian tourism industry more than $3 billion lost in revenue, with revenues from international tourism generating only $1.023 billion in 2020, down 79.2 per cent compared to $4.919 billion in 2019.
