Hoeing, seeding, and picking may not sound like a holiday but their appeal is gaining as more and more people want to see where their food comes from. The same drive that leads them to visit farmers’ markets or join community-supported agriculture, farm-share programs is drawing them to the farm itself. Thus an industry is born: agritourism.

Agritourism includes a wide variety of farm activities. Though most visitors spend an afternoon picking fruit or feeding animals, others remain several days, contributing to tasks ranging from planting crops to building greenhouses. In Vermont, income from agritourism totaled $19.5 million in 2002, nearly twice the amount recorded in 2000, according to the United States Department of Agriculture. Though there are no similar statistics for more recent years, agritourism leaders in the state say the figures continue to rise. In North Carolina, 46 percent of agritourism operators surveyed reported an increase in income in 2004 from 2003. And in Tennessee, agritourism enterprises directly added about $17 million to the economy in 2006 and brought in more than three million visitors a year, according to the state agritourism coordinator.