Ohio Agricultural Law Blog -- What We’ve Been Up To: Factsheets on Reducing Risk in Agritourism

Agritourism continues to boom across the United States, with agritourism farms offering activities from apple picking to zip lining.  Literally A to Z.  Consumer interest in food and farming, along with an economic need to augment farm income through diversification, have combined to drive this boom.  As more farms delve into agritourism, their liability risks change.  Risk and liability are hard, if not impossible, to totally eliminate, but there are a number of steps that agritourism farms can take to reduce the chances of something bad happening.

Based upon the questions generated from our law bulletin on Ohio’s agritourism law, we wanted to take an in depth look at common legal issues and risks facing agritourism.  Created as part of a project for the Agricultural & Food Law Consortium, our new factsheet series does just that.  Specifically, these factsheets examine:

• Legal risks of animal and human interactions
• Selling food on the farm
• Agritourism immunity laws across the country
• Zoning laws across the country
• Insurance coverage for agritourism

Each factsheet addresses common considerations and questions about starting and operating an agritourism farm, and provides links to helpful resources.  The factsheets are designed to have something for everyone in the industry.  From those just thinking about implementing agritourism who need to think about the basic risks, to those agritourism farms that are already well established and want a risk refresher.  Beyond the industry, those professionals who advise agritourism farms may find the considerations helpful.

Most of the new factsheets include a checklist.  The checklists include questions that an agritourism farmer should ask their attorney, zoning inspector, insurance provider, local health department, and more.  The checklists do not represent the only legal concerns that an agritourism farm must think about, but rather a starting point.  Every agritourism farm is unique, and must be treated as such when examining liability and risk.

The reducing legal risk in agritourism project is available on our website HERE, as well as the National Agricultural Law Center’s website HERE.  This material is based upon work supported by the National Agricultural Library, Agricultural Research Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture.