Cambodia seeks to draw more Chinese tourists in the future

Recently, Cambodia’s Tourism Ministry released a tourism report, which was focused on attracting approximately 2 million Chinese tourists in the next 4 years.

According to Thong Khon, the Tourism Minister of Cambodia, the number of Chinese tourists visiting Cambodia has already experienced a remarkable increase in the next few years, which makes China the second largest source market for Cambodia’s tourism in 2015. However, there is still much to be done to improve the quality of Cambodia’s tourism. One important measure would be using target marketing on Chinese tourists. “Marketing Cambodia as a tourist destination in the Chinese market is still limited and tourism facilities are not meeting the expectations of Chinese tourists,” Khon said.

About 13 million Chinese tourists visited Southeast Asia in 2014, but only 560,000 of them visited Cambodia, making the country lag behind its neighbors like Thailand and Vietnam. In order to draw more Chinese tourists, Cambodia wishes to takes a series of steps to facilitate the visits of Chinese tourists, like providing documents of visa processing in Chinese language. Meanwhile, the country plans to upgrade its tourism facilities as most of the Chinese tourists are looking for high-end services.

Cambodia is famous for its history and the fascinating culture in Southeast Asia, but the poor conditions of its tourism facilities are stopping Chinese tourists who are interested in visiting Cambodia. On the other hand, the limited number of direct flights between China and Cambodia is also an impediment for potential Chinese tourists who are interested to visit Southeast Asia. For them, travelling to Thailand or Vietnam would be more convenient.

Given the abundant travel resources (like Angkor Wat). Cambodia will be able to attract more Chinese tourists in the future if it takes the right steps. A possible way would be to cooperate with Chinese tour operators, as they have the experience and expertise to provide Chinese tourists with satisfactory services.

Source: The Phnom Penh Post

Photo: flickr