Biuso trekked out to Maverick Farms in North Carolina to spend a weekend weeding, hoeing and harvesting vegetables.  For this privilege she paid $120 a night, minus $7 for every hour of labor she committed (up to 25% of the bill can be sweated off).  In New York City, my friend Anne Saxelby, who owns a small all-American artisan cheese shop, has put together several successful events that she calls “A Day A-Whey,” day trips out to local cheesemaking farms.  “We’ve moved to an experience economy,” says Rich Pirog of the Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture.  “People want to have a farm experience.” 

Agritourism is a much bigger tourist attraction in Europe, especially Italy, where the tradition is over twenty years old and agriturismos receive tax breaks to host visitors.  But as the Times article observes, some states are taking notes.  Vermont’s Extension Service formed the Vermont Farms! Association to organize and promote agritourism in the state.  In 2002, income from agritourism in Vermont totaled $19.5 million, nearly twice the amount that the USDA says it had garnered in 2000; in Tennessee last year, agritourism added $17 million to the economy. 

In the end, though, farmers are doing far more than exploiting paying guests for their labor.  The education farms and farmers impart begets respect for and a deeper understanding of their contributions.  And if perhaps they’re preaching to the choir, at least that choir is going to leave the farm and talk about it.  “It’s so much more than farming,” said Alyssa Rudolph of Maverick.  “It’s about the conversation.”