The Colorado Tourism Office is joining the Colorado Department of Agriculture in a new push to elevate the state’s myriad agricultural tourism opportunities.
The effort — floated in a 10-meeting tour across Colorado this month — is part the state’s campaign to draw tourists into farms, wineries and ranches, connecting visitors with their food, their farmers and Colorado’s rich agricultural history.
“It connects people back to their land, their people, their place,” said Kelli Hepler, whose Delta County Tourism has a seven-year agritourism program.
In Delta County, visitors can pick potatoes and grapes, help shear sheep, visit cheese makers and even mend fences. They can go harvest produce for a meal they cook back at their B&B. They can dine with farmers and tour wineries on bikes.
The new tourism office program – discussed at the final of 10 strategic meetings Thursday at Denver’s Colorado History Museum – would model Delta County’s program around the state, by developing educational and recreational opportunities inside working ranches and farms.
There are more than 37,000 farms in Colorado and the 2007 Census of Agriculture showed only 679 of those – less than 2 percent – reported income from agritourism. Most of that came from hunting and fishing, as well increasingly popular farm dinners and classes for cheese making or canning. With a more unified campaign, those opportunities will grow.
“It’s not just corn mazes and pumpkin patches,” said Dan Hobbs, who runs a 30-acre family farm in Avondale. “This really represents a true retail opportunity for farmers. These are people who are coming to your operation.”
In 2008, then state senators Al White and Jack Taylor wrote legislation that directs interest from the state’s unclaimed property fund toward agritourism promotion. That provides about $350,000 a year, said White, who now heads the Colorado Tourism Office.
Colorado is the only state with dedicated funding for agritourism, but nearly every state has formal agritourism programs.
The state’s heritage tourism program is designed to help raise awareness and protect Colorado’s historical treasures.
“With agritourism, we are really doing the same thing,” said Amy Webb, the director of the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s Heritage Tourism Program, who has been surveying each state’s agritourism programs to help develop Colorado’s new campaign. “This can be another way to make our farms and ranches economically viable in the long term.”
Webb’s research shows state liability laws protecting farmers and ranchers is a critical issue when developing a statewide agritourism program. About half of the states have agritourism liability legislation. Other issues address roadside signs directing travelers toward agritourism activities and accreditation programs for agritourism businesses.
At the near-capacity meeting Thursday, a mingling of farmers and ranchers expressed interest in the new effort. Many were curious how the state would help promote tourist agricultural activities.
“People don’t know what agritourism is but they know what a garden is,” said Chuck Hoover, assistant manager of Centennial’s Tagawa Gardens, where visitors can stroll through massive indoor and outdoor nurseries. “I know it would take money but it would help to get the Colorado agritourism brand out there. It seems like people are already participating, they just don’t know what it’s called.”
Jason Blevins: 303-954-1374, jblevins@denverpost.com or twitter.com/jasontblevins