Sustainable tourism: in Cyprus, Cambodia defends its “green gold”
From 31 August to 4 September, the Kingdom took part in a Francophone seminar in Nicosia and Famagusta devoted to sustainable tourism, youth employability and the mobilisation of financing. A pilot country for the International Organisation of La Francophonie’s Destination Éco-Talents project, Cambodia argued there for a tourism model rooted in its territories. At the same moment, its international arrivals are down 46%.
Four days between Nicosia and Famagusta
The seminar’s title set out the agenda on its own: “Sustainable Tourism Development, Youth Employment Opportunities and Mobilising Financing”. It was co-organised and co-funded by the Government of the Republic of Cyprus and the Francophonie Institute for Sustainable Development (IFDD), a subsidiary body of the OIF.
Around 67 participants from 19 countries attended: government officials, international organisations, technical and financial partners, project holders and academics. The proceedings were chaired by Cyprus’s Deputy Minister of Tourism, Kostas Koumis, and by the Director of the IFDD, Cécile Martin-Phipps.
Cambodia was represented by Mol Vibol, Secretary of State at the Ministry of Labour and Vocational Training (MLVT). The choice of ministry matters. In Cyprus, tourism was treated as a question of jobs and skills rather than one of promotion.
The programme covered destination management, training and job placement, women’s entrepreneurship, heritage development and access to financing. A field day took the delegations to meet Cypriot tourism operators.
Destination Éco-Talents, a pilot at the halfway mark
Launched under the OIF’s 2024-2027 programming, the Destination Éco-Talents (DET) project runs in four pilot countries: Cabo Verde, Cambodia, the Comoros and Vietnam. Its stated aim is to turn tourism into a source of local income, with young people, women and rural communities as the priority.
The reasoning starts from an economic observation. In many developing countries, 40 to 50% of gross tourism receipts leak out of local economies. Communities, guides, artisans and small operators capture only a fraction of what visitors spend.
The first call for projects, which closed in April 2025, drew 173 applications. Twelve were selected, three of them in Cambodia: the training and circuit programme run by Sala Baï, the circular tourism ecosystem for young people and women at Run Ta Ek, and a riverside tourism project in the Mekong flooded forest. Grants range from 15,000 to 50,000 euros over a maximum of twelve months.
A second call was launched in late 2025 with a deadline of 28 February 2026. It attracted more than 120 applications across the four countries, with the Comoros submitting the largest number. Three winners per country were again expected.
1,034 young people placed, 16 circuits, two centres in Siem Reap
The Cyprus seminar was first of all a review exercise. According to the IFDD, 1,034 young people were placed in jobs or internships across the four pilot countries in 2025, and 16 tourism circuits were developed.
Cambodia also hosts two Destination Éco-Talents centres, both in Siem Reap. One is housed by Artisans Angkor, on a site that receives around 75,000 visitors a year. The other is attached to the Paul Dubrule Hotel and Tourism School. The centres guide visitors, connect professionals and run short practical workshops.
Across the project as a whole, the OIF is targeting 700 jobs created, five DET centres and more than 1,000 tourism professionals trained.
Cambodia’s bet on vocational training
The MLVT’s presence in Cyprus points back to a domestic agenda. Since 2024 the government has run a technical and vocational training programme aimed at 1.5 million young people. Around 271,000 had enrolled by the end of April 2026, of whom 229,000 trained in public institutions.
On 15 June, at the 9th National Technical and Vocational Education and Training Day, Prime Minister Hun Manet asked the ministry to prioritise quality over enrolment numbers. Labour Minister Heng Sour noted that 262 institutions fall under his ministry’s supervision, including 37 public and 201 private ones.
The DET project pushes in the same direction, with a Francophone twist: it builds professional French into the curriculum as a route into hotel and guiding jobs.
“Green gold” and micro-destinations: the Tourism Ministry’s case
Chouk Chumnor, Director General of Tourism Development and International Cooperation at the Ministry of Tourism, spoke at a roundtable on structuring networks and small-scale tourism destinations.
He used the phrase the government applies to the sector: “green gold”. And he set out a method, bringing local communities, the private sector and training institutions to work together while protecting natural and cultural resources.
Two areas were highlighted. First the Siem Reap–Tonle Sap tourism area, where the challenge is to move visitors beyond the temple perimeter. Then the Kratie–Stung Treng corridor on the upper Mekong. That corridor holds assets that remain under-used: Irrawaddy dolphins, river islands, flooded forests, silk weaving. It also holds some of the country’s highest poverty indicators.
The argument is easy to state and hard to deliver: keep the value a visitor creates inside the territory, instead of watching it flow back to the capitals and to foreign operators.
A bad year for Cambodian tourism
The context gives the debate a particular edge. Between January and July 2026, Cambodia received 1.99 million international tourists, a fall of 46% year on year. In the first half alone, arrivals dropped to 1.75 million from 3.36 million a year earlier.
Tourism Minister Huot Hak has attributed the decline to several factors: negative publicity around online scam networks, tensions on the border with Thailand, higher fuel prices and weaker global travel demand. China, Vietnam and the United States remain the top three source markets.
The ministry has built three scenarios for the year. The worst case points to 4.6 to 4.8 million visitors. The most optimistic, which assumes the current crises are resolved, rises to 6.1 to 6.3 million. A pilot visa-free scheme for Chinese nationals ran from 15 June to 15 October.
Community tourism and micro-destinations will not offset a collapse of that size. But they occupy a growing place in official discourse as the volume-driven model shows its limits.
Financing, the central question
A large part of the seminar was devoted to money. The aim was to bring projects closer to the resources available, particularly in ecotourism and impact tourism.
The IFDD is open about what comes next. In the spring it launched a tender for a consultant tasked with identifying funding niches, spotting the DET models that can be replicated and drafting a forward-looking note for the 2028-2031 programming. In other words, turning a pilot into an approach that donors will fund at scale.
The Mekong Institute, based in Khon Kaen, also took part, sharing regional experience in smart tourism, heritage, creative industries and innovative development financing.
Next stop, Phnom Penh in November
The Cyprus meeting sits inside a busy Francophone season for Cambodia. A full member of the OIF since 1993, the Kingdom will host the 20th Francophonie Summit in Phnom Penh on 15 and 16 November, under the theme “Restoring peace for shared prosperity and lasting stability”.
The event was originally planned for Siem Reap and moved to the capital in February for logistical reasons. It will bring together delegations from some 90 member, associate and observer states and governments.
The conclusions reached in Cyprus are meant to feed into the preparation of the OIF’s next programming cycle. For Cambodia, the more immediate deadline is domestic: the high season will show which of the Tourism Ministry’s three scenarios holds.
Initial information: EuroCham Cambodia.
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