Tourism and science: the synergy that brings research to remote areas of Colombia

The role assigned to educational institutions as promoters of knowledge and research requires them to be at the forefront of all theory and methodology that allows them to carry out this work, not only inside the classroom and their laboratories but also in larger environments where more people are impacted.In this context, Science and technology policy in Colombia has given special prominence to Citizen Science models to bring science closer to non-scientists. Such a model is defined as one that seeks to produce new scientific knowledge through a participatory and open research project, guided by academia, but with actors who do not necessarily work within this field (Vohland et al 2021). Despite the great boom and benefits that this model brings to stimulate the appreciation of science and the development of research capabilities in society, many areas of the country, that are inhabited and have natural or cultural characteristics of high interest,are left out of their radius of action because they do not have academic centers with research capacity; Moreover its represent a high financial expense for researchers who consider developing their projects there. In this context, the research was aimed at identifying a strategy that would allow overcoming the difficulty of lack of resources to take the model to remote areas of the country. The strategy identified was -the Scientific Tourism-, which the research defines as "The Type of Tourism aimed at a tourist who values paying for experiences that allow him to be part of the generation of knowledge about the places he visits, through experiences mediated by the scientific method." (Diaz Cano 2023). The main contribution of the research was to formulate, based on a documentary review of successful TC case studies in the world, a scheme that indicates the way in which actors who seek to fulfill their role of generating science can expand their radius of action in remote areas from scientific tourism business plans that benefit both the tourist and the local communities that are linked to such projects.