Tourism Rehabilitation Workshop highlights need for partnerships and digital payments in Cambodia’s recovery

Trove’s Visitor Experience Design team reports from the Cambodian workshop with major experts from Cambodia and the wider region.

The cross-sector workshop on July 1st was a turning point for Cambodian tourism as it united major stakeholders to discuss some of the most important trends and learning points from pre COVID and during COVID. Present on the call were influential members of the Ministry of Tourism, including H.E. Thong Rathasak and Mr. CHOUB Ratana, as well as members of the private sector, donor funds, and other regional and domestic government agencies.

Panelists for the first part of the workshop on Cambodian tourism recovery.

The first part of the workshop also highlighted the trends in Cambodia around private and public stakeholders working together during COVID-19 to recover socially and economically from the financial impact of the pandemic.

A few strategies highlighted to rebuilding tourism include cross-border tourism cooperation (as regional tourism will be the new trend in 2021 and 2022), a regional tourism board, and communications across six member governments. H.E. Thong Rathasak highlighted a high rate of vaccination across the Cambodian population as well as the nation’s recovery plan, which includes an inbound vaccinated travelers policy which is currently in progress. The first workshop also set up the role of the private sector in investing in technologies to catalyze tourism development (for instance, the Wonderpass solution).

As an extention of the first half of the webinar, the second half of the webinar focused on the light at the end of the tunnel and the potential of digital payment technology for catalyzing recovery. It is time for "new solutions", stated Gavin Bell of the AFD who served as MC. The "track and trace" technology has shown major improvements for contact tracing through QR codes in Cambodia thus far, and contactless payments are more relevant now more than ever. In addition to Mr. Bell, present in this panel were H.E. Thong Rathasak (Director General of Tourism Development and International Cooperation of Cambodia), Mr. Jeff Laflamma (Haystack Asia), Mr. Ray Cabrera (Acting Director of Merchant Management of Wing Bank), Lok Chumteay Chea Ratha (CEO and Founder of Khmun eShop), Lok Chumteav Chhay Sivlin (President of the Cambodian Association of Travel Agents - CATA), H.E. AING Sovannroath (Executive Director of Cambodia 4.0 Center), and Mr. Thourn Sinan (President of the Pacific Asia Travel Association, Cambodia Chapter).

The second part of the workshop on the advent of digital payments in the tourism sector in Cambodia.

According to H.E. Sovvanroath using technology to gain productivity is a major factor to tourism growth post-COVID. Tourism is the #1 method of bringing more and more economic development in the country. Tourism will be a key factor to the recovery of the Cambodian economic sector in the near future as well.  We need to incorporate new elements in the tourism development in order to make that happen, such as contactless products.

COVID-19 has affected the local spending and shopping behaviors, as well as the e-commerce platforms that are local to Cambodia. COVID-19 has made many local businesses shut down. Khmun, as an example, is an ecommerce marketplace and payment gateway. Innovative approaches to shopping have supported Cambodia through lockdowns and will continue to support Cambodia's tourism recovery post-COVID. In addition, through Wing Bank and other bank partners, QR and contactless payments are provided for merchant partners. A merchant solution is all-in-one and can cater to various segmentation to pay using QR codes at those outlets. Merchants are able to accept payments from tourists in a variety of languages and messaging platforms. Wing Bank's merchant application, for example, was launched recently to try to drive less cash transactions. Currently, the tourist sector has been affected so Wing Bank's solution is working to be ready when international tourism opens back up in Cambodia. Preparing for the future is critical, especially on a digital perspective.

The tourism industry also has realized the criticality of contactless payments in the bounce-back of the tourism and hospitality sector. CATA stressed that the tourism sector has a responsibility to encourage customers and work with operators to stress e-payments in transactions. Online payment platforms are not a problem, said PATA. But a major area for improvement is payment platforms in the tourism sector specifically, where bank transfers between countries are difficult. Other challenges include working with multiple vendors, rules and regulations on the supplier side, and dealing with out of stock suppliers.

Haystack Asia, the creator of Wonderpass, underscored the importance of digital payments in the tourism sector. Wonderpass is a wristband technology that allows payments, attractions, and a marketplace that is able to provide safety to travelers while providing data to the industry. Wonderpass integrates with tourism products and is fully mobile compatible.

As H.E. Sovvanroath stated at the end of the event, as Cambodia continues to use digital payments in the tourism sector, there is potential to serve as an example for the rest of the world on how to use technology to help tour operators, travel agencies, hotels, restaurants, and other tourism products bounce back in a safe and effective way. The event demonstrated that there is a lot of work to do but that in Cambodia, innovation and public-private partnerships are key to progress.

At Trove, our Strategic Planning and Visitor Experience Design teams work closely with tourism boards to integrate new technologies and streamline planning for during COVID and post-COVID. Our fundamental mission is to not let technology sit on the shelf and to incorporate the right marketing campaigns, branding strategies, online and social strategies to get technology in the minds of the highest value users and secure long-term adaptation of new technology. Learn more here.

Cambodia’s tourism roadmap and Siem Reap’s master plan for tourism approved

Cambodia has just announced their tourism roadmap for 2021-2025, a plan which will promote both tourism marketing in the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic as well as sustainable tourism development. In addition, the Siem Reap tourism development plan for 2021-2035 was approved by the Ministry of Tourism.

These are two major moves that will support the development and bounce back of Cambodia’s tourism industry. The recovery roadmap is segmented in three stages:

1. Resilience and Restart: Crisis management in the New Normal and recovery preparation in 2021

2. Recovery: Rebuilding of Cambodia’s tourism industry after the COVID-19 crisis in 2022-2023

3. Relaunch: Full rebound of tourism in 2024-2015

Two fundamental strategic accomplishments like these mark major progress by Cambodia in achieving their post COVID-19 goals. More and more destinations around the world are re-assessing their tourism master plans and creating new plans for crisis management, public health, hygiene and community development. These are important areas of focus as destinations continue to plan for the future.

Also important for Cambodia in ensuring adequate follow through after the build of these documents will be the implementation of these strategies. There are a few critical questions that the Ministry of Tourism will need to answer:

1. What will the governance process look like for the implementation of these tourism strategies?

2. What are associated marketing campaigns that must be implemented to propel not only Siem Reap but the rest of the region?

3. How will the recovery plan support development of other areas in Cambodia, including the 4K provinces (Coastal provinces)?

4. What will on-going training of field offices and tour operators look like?

5. How will the Ministry of Tourism accurately gauge public sentiment both in and out of Cambodia in regards to comfortability around travel and Cambodia as a tourism destination overall?

Cambodia has ambitious goals for tourism development in the coming months and years and we look forward to seeing increased tourism to Cambodia to allow for gradual economic growth, community development and cultural exchange in the Kingdom of Wonder.

Learn more about Trove’s Strategic Planning practice here.