Data Collection Platform

The tourism and hospitality industry worldwide is becoming increasingly digitised, driven by the growth of online bookings, digital payment systems, and targeted online marketing campaigns. In the post-COVID context, travellers rely more than ever on digital platforms, such as Online Travel Agencies (OTAs) and booking platforms. Tourism demand has evolved rapidly, with trends such as the growing demand for luxury, sustainable, and experience-based travel, especially in Southeast Asia.

Data plays a critical role in helping tourism stakeholders understand evolving consumer behaviour and adapt their services accordingly. Traditionally, data sharing in the sector has been a two-way process:

• Public authorities, particularly Ministries of Tourism, provide macro-level data such as tourist arrivals and departures, tourism revenues, and visitors’ countries of origin.
• Private sector actors generate valuable micro-level data, including booking trends, occupancy rates, and customer reviews.

When effectively analysed, including through A.I. tools like big data analytics, such information can significantly enhance both public policymaking and private sector competitiveness, and destination attractiveness. Several countries in the region have already taken steps in this direction. For instance, in 2018, the Singapore Tourism Board launched the Singapore Tourism Analytics Network (STAN), a platform designed to combine government data with anonymised private-sector data to generate deeper insights into tourism trends, while ensuring data privacy and confidentiality.

In Cambodia, however, data sharing and management between the private sector and public authorities remains limited. Few structured frameworks or formal mechanisms exist to facilitate systematic data exchange related to tourism behaviour and market trends. This represents a missed opportunity to modernise tourism governance and improve sector-wide decision-making. In this context, the newly established Cambodia Tourism Board (CTB) could play a central role in coordinating and promoting a structured data-sharing platform, acting as a bridge between government institutions and private sector stakeholders, and supporting a more integrated, data-driven approach to tourism development.

The lack of structured data and information sharing practices prevents tourism operators from obtaining a comprehensive understanding of current travel behaviors. While aggregate figures such as total arrivals are available, these indicators alone do not fully reflect changing consumer profiles, behaviors, and preferences (spending patterns and emerging market segments). They do not allow proper planning and risk management. As a result, private sector actors risk misaligning their services with actual demand, leading to inefficiencies and mismatches between tourism supply and market expectations. At the same time, limited access to private-sector data constrains the Government’s ability to design targeted and effective tourism promotion campaigns, assess policy impacts, and respond with targeted policies.