All About Agritourism

By Stephanie Oelsligle Jordan, Local Food program manager

While purchasing crops and products from local farms is an important part of supporting our local food system, it is only one way to support the work and livelihood of local farmers. Another way is agritourism, which puts farms and farmers face-to-face with community members who can grow to know them.

Agritourism can take a lot of forms. Some examples include a u-pick, farm dinner, farm tour, harvest event, etc. Small and mid-sized farmers are utilizing agritourism more and more to supplement their income as farmers and help make ends meet.

The Solano Local Food System Alliance is dedicated to supporting an environmentally sustainable, economically viable, socially just and equitable local food system in Solano County. The Alliance brings together a variety of stakeholders, organizations and agencies that work within the local food system, from producers to retailers to food access providers. An important part of the Alliance’s work is education. It holds regular educational forums to learn more about topics that intersect with the local food system.

On Oct. 2, the topic was agritourism. In Solano County, the Suisun Valley region has been employing agritourism for many years, but other regions have not. The Alliance wanted to understand more — what agritourism is, how it can benefit farmers, its economic impacts and best practices from around the region.

The Alliance invited Rachael Callahan, Statewide Agritourism Coordinator for UC SAREP (Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program), and Olivia Henry, UC Cooperative Extension‘s Regional Food Systems Advisor, to address these questions during the online forum, which you can watch in the video above. Also included is a short interview with Lisa Howard, owner and winemaker of Tolenas Winery, who explained how agritourism began in Suisun Valley and the benefits it has for growers in the region today.