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Special & vocational

Cambodia

A culinary academy that prints an international rate — and it is under five thousand.

5/5
ingredients confirmed
Every ingredient this page asks for has a figure and a source.
Tuition
~$4.8k/yr
Living
36.3% of US prices
A comparison of prices, not a budget: it says what things cost here against the United States, not what a month will cost you. Compared at country level, so capital cities and large metros run higher. The price level prices the basket residents buy, and a foreign renter cannot reach the cheap end of local housing — poorer countries may still sit too low here.
Field reputation
Regionally credible in hospitality
Industry access
The quota bites hardest in exactly these jobs
Safety
2.075 · 96th of 163
Ninety-sixth of 163, and one of the largest deteriorations in this edition after the 2025 border fighting with Thailand

More is being checked.

Where these figures came from

One row per ingredient. Open any of them for the source, how far we trust it, and when we last checked.

Tuition~$4.8k/yr

The Academy of Culinary Arts Cambodia publishes the total cost of its two-year diploma on its own site: $8,080 for Cambodian students and $9,600 for international students, which is $4,800 a year. The academy states that donor funding holds the price below what the programme costs to run. No conversion: the school prices in dollars.

Confidence
printed in the source
Last checked
2026-09
Living36.3% of US prices

World Bank, 2024, CC BY 4.0: the PPP conversion factor for household consumption is 1477.7937 local currency units per international dollar, against an official exchange rate of 4072.3972 to the US dollar. Their ratio, 0.363, is the price level against the United States, whose own ratio is 1 by construction. Both figures are theirs; the division is ours. See the Pathoff method, section 12.

A comparison of prices, not a budget: it says what things cost here against the United States, not what a month will cost you. Compared at country level, so capital cities and large metros run higher. The price level prices the basket residents buy, and a foreign renter cannot reach the cheap end of local housing — poorer countries may still sit too low here.

Confidence
made by us from the source
Field reputationRegionally credible in hospitality

Pathoff education rubric (the Pathoff method, section 9-2), special band "Regionally credible": Hospitality and culinary training here is built on an ASEAN-aligned curriculum with internships in hotels across the region. At the foot of the band: it is respected within Southeast Asian hospitality and unknown beyond it.

Confidence
made by us from the source
Industry accessThe quota bites hardest in exactly these jobs

Pathoff outcome rubric (the Pathoff method, section 10-3), special outcome band "A route that needs an employer": Judged on its own and it lands below the degree route, because the foreign-worker quota and the labour-ministry permit are aimed squarely at the service and trade roles a hospitality qualification leads to. At the foot of the band, though the right to remain in the country survives the job here as elsewhere.

Confidence
made by us from the source
Rule
No change known to us
Last checked
2026-09
Safety2.075 · 96th of 163

Global Peace Index 2026, Institute for Economics and Peace: score 2.075, ranked 96 of 163. Both figures are theirs; we publish them as they are.

Ninety-sixth of 163, and one of the largest deteriorations in this edition after the 2025 border fighting with Thailand

Confidence
printed in the source

What it is like here

Cambodia is one of the few countries on this site whose vocational sector actually publishes what a foreigner pays: Phnom Penh’s culinary academy prints both rates side by side, with the international one at $9,600 for a two-year diploma. The training is built around Cambodian hospitality and its internships are here, which is also its limit — the qualification travels no further than the region.

How the process works

1

Apply to the academy directly

The international rate is published alongside the Cambodian one.

⏱ 1–3 months
2

Ordinary visa, extended annually

The same route a resident uses; no separate training permit exists.

⏱ 2–4 weeks

Where the training is

Phnom Penh
The culinary academy and the hotel kitchens it places into
Siem Reap
The oldest hospitality school in the country, and the tourism economy

Open any ingredient above to see where its figure came from, how far we trust it and when we last checked. Nothing here is a substitute for the official source. Last reviewed 2026-09-04.

Photograph of Cambodia by Jakub Hałun, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.