ADDITIONAL airport facilities, new infrastructure and improved flight scheduling are all on the agenda to boost tourist development, local businesses and visitor numbers in the Kingdom, with the focus on Siem Reap and Sihanoukville.

Bretton Sciaroni, senior partner of Sciaroni & Associates and a legal adviser to the government, said that while the Royal Government was doing what it could to provide impetus to revitalise the real estate and construction sectors, there were other steps that should be taken including looking at the huge potential for real estate development on the southern coast of Cambodia.

Further life can be put into a sector of the economy lagging behind the others

But he said the development of the beachfront areas and islands in that part of the country was dependent upon getting regularly scheduled flights to the Sihanoukville Airport.

He claimed major hotels and resorts would not be built there unless there was a regular and reliable way to get tourists and others to the southern coast.

This meant that there must be scheduled air flights.

Sciaroni said that with scheduled flights, hotels and resorts – as well as the ancillary businesses and residential areas – could be built, and therefore inject further life into a sector of the economy the recovery of which was lagging behind the others.

While in the northern part of the country the proposed new airport, 60 kilometres from Siem Reap, would provide a billion-dollar building investment, debate is deepening over the plans to build the facility.

The Council for the Development of Cambodia approved investment from South Korea’s Camco Airport Co and Lees A&A Co to build the second Siem Reap airport with the aim of attracting direct flights from more overseas countries and increasing tourist numbers.