Survey

The statistics collected from the ticket sales concession holder for Angkor Park confirm the constant inscrease in tourist numbers. Given the intensive flow of visitor arrivals, tourist management of the Angkor Park has become a priority for the protection of Cambodia's historical and cultural heritage.

In order to set up management procedures, the Department of Tourism requires a public survey, a "measuring instrument" necessary to ascertain the needs, expectations and behavior patterns of the various publics and to shape the policy for the park's development and layout. The master plan being prepared for park management must take into account both the issue of monument conservation and tourist demands.

A public survey was put in place in April 2000 in cooperation with the FSP project (Fonds de solidarité prioritaire, formerly Fonds d'aide à la coopération FAC) with the theme "Angkor site-Heritage and Development" in the framework of the "Institutional Support to the APSARA Authority" program.

The purpose

The purpose of the quantitative and qualitative survey is to collate the results of actual counts and surveys in the field in order to:

- Get an accurate picture of the number of persons visiting the major monuments and to compile statistics to be able to take necessary measures in the event of visitor overload
- Know the various publics that visit Angkor and their needs in order to draw up a tourism development master plan
- Prepare a policy for the management of visitor flows
- Promote sites that are unknown to the public

The survey has been operating in the field since March 2000.

The project phases

The preliminary study took three months (March, April, Mai 200 and sought to get information such as:
- Tourism data for the country (statistics relating to seasons and locations)
- The rating given to Angkor in relation to other tourist attractions
- Seasonal variations in tourist numbers
- Visitor number cuves on a weekly or daily basis, where possible
- The presentation of the various visitor nationalities and places of origin, local, national and international (determined by an actual count)

The surveys are conducted by tourism professionals (travel agents and hotels in Phnom Penh and Siemreap). Actual count of visitors were made firstly at the temples of Angkor Wat and Banteay Srei, and this operation has now been extended to the Ta Prohm temple and more recently to Phnom Bakheng.