Angkor Wat ticket sales generated $62.5 million last year, a 4.21% increase on a year earlier, while the number of foreign visitors rose 4.63 % to 2.19 million.
Revenue from tickets to the Angkor Archeological Park, home of the famous temple, has gone up slightly since the government withdrew rights from a private company -- Sokimex Group -- to manage the park, the Khmer Times reported on Tuesday.
One-day tickets were the most popular, said Chong Sokhemera, an official at the Angkor Institute.
“The one-day ticket was top in sales because most foreign tourists choose mostly one day to visit the park and other days to visit elsewhere,” Sokhemera said.
From February, the new price for entrance to the park will increase to bring it in line with other tourism destinations in the region and some of the income will go to charity.
The new price of a one-day pass will be $37, up from the current $20, a three-day pass goes up to $62 from $40 and a weekly pass to $72 from $60.
Ho Vandy, the secretary-general of the Cambodia National Tourism Alliance, said the potential of attracting tourists had still to be fully realised.
“The tourist numbers are increasing but the rise is quite flat. We want to a much bigger increase than this,” he said. “Establishing more tourism products will attract tourists to stay longer so that other sectors will benefit.”
Vandy said threats of terrorism and natural disasters in the region and around the world may be behind the flat growth of tourism in 2016. In 2015, some 2.1 million foreign tourists visited Angkor Archeological Park, bringing revenues of $60 million, up from 2.05 million tourists and $59.3 million in 2014.