Balancing Conservation and Tourism: German-Polish Project Develops Monitoring for Protected Areas

International

How can nature conservation and tourism coexist in sensitive protected areas? The German-Polish project "MoPA" aims to answer this by developing sustainable visitor management and socio-economic monitoring in the Lower Oder Valley.

The Pomerania Euroregion, spanning multiple national parks across borders, comprises over 20 protected areas. Ecologically interconnected, the region faces challenges balancing environmental protection with economic and settlement interests. MoPA seeks to harmonise monitoring procedures and introduce socio-economic tools to collect comparable data on tourism impacts.

During a field visit, Norman Ebert from the University for Sustainable Development in Eberswalde and Wojtek Zbaraszewski from the West Pomeranian Technical University in Szczecin guided visitors to a viewing platform over the Lower Oder Valley. “We focus on nature experience sites with infrastructure,” said Ebert. Zbaraszewski added, “One key aspect is a simplified method to assess regional economic impacts of tourism in protected areas.”

Dirk Treichel, head of the Lower Oder Valley National Park, stressed the paradox of conservation: “The best action is often to do nothing—but that becomes difficult when local needs and nature protection clash.”

Visitor management is essential to national parks, ensuring nature is preserved and not overwhelmed by tourism. A short canoe trip on the Oder and a drive past Mescherin's observation tower illustrated how certain areas can guide tourism while others remain undisturbed.

More about the MoPA project: https://mopa.zut.edu.pl

About the Project

Part of the EU-funded "EU4regions" initiative, MoPA contributes to cohesion policy goals for 2021–2027: innovation, sustainability, connectivity, social inclusion, and citizen proximity. Interreg projects from Germany and neighbouring countries (including Poland, Austria, the Netherlands, and others) will be featured to show how EU policy impacts regions. While climate remains central, social and economic sustainability are equally highlighted.

EU4regions is supported by the European Commission.