SENSA2

Inspiration

Following on from the SENSA1 project, where the challenge was to increase revenues for protected areas through tourism while ensuring conservation of these unique and unspoilt natural parks and nature reserves, the SENSA2 project will make it possible to add a set of additional activities to provide a more robust and comprehensive service. This will involve upgrading existing services and performing various updates, which will include in particular the introduction of a monitoring & trends tool, and enhanced features for park management and rangers. Lastly, social media integration will be upgraded to allow friends and family to follow the travel experiences of tourists.


Innovation

In order to successfully implement the different planned SENSA2 developments, LIST will be in charge of various test phases. In parallel, researchers from LIST are focusing on the development of monitoring & trends as well as the development of the Smart Exchange Module (SEM), which is the core module enabling communication between all the components.


Impact

SENSA2 aims to improve the various existing platforms, such as:

• Environment Protection Platform (EPP), which is used by park authorities to manage park-related data (geospatial data, park administrative data, messages exchanged with rangers and tourists, and device management (satellite trackers)).
• Eco-Tourism Platform (ETP), which is used by travel operators and responsible travellers.
• Smart Exchange Module (SEM), which makes it possible to manage communication between the different components/platforms. 
• Traveller Mob APP (TMA), a mobile application for tourists which can be used with WiFi or 3G or a satellite tracker to send messages via satellite when there is no WiFi or 3G connection.
• Ranger Mob APP (RMA), which is a mobile application for rangers and can be used with WiFi or 3G or a satellite tracker to send messages via satellite when there is no WiFi or 3G connection.

Eventually, this upgrade will help provide platforms that are increasingly tailored to the needs of the project target groups, namely actors involved in the management of protected areas and national parks, as well as local responsible travel operators and eco-tourism service providers, while at the same time meeting the needs of tourists seeking authentic and natural travel experiences in areas of unspoilt wilderness.