A Study on Challenges and Suggestions of Farmers to Promote Agro Tourism Centres in Karnataka State in India

Agriculture in India is facing acute problems from production till marketing of the produce. Hence, it is needed to supplement the income of rural folk and the Indian farmers should find an alternate means of livelihood and agro tourism is one such approach. It also has the capacity to generate a marginal or supplementary source of income and also creates employment opportunities to the farmers. The study was conducted in four selected districts viz., Bangalore, Chikmagalur, Hassan, and Madikeri districts of Karnataka state. In total 120 farmers were interviewed personally with an objective to understand the challenges the farmers face in promotion of ATC and also sought their suggestions to overcome the challenges. Expost facto design was used for the study. The study revealed that, high cost of labour (83.33%) was the major financial challenge it is due to fact that the most of the labourers were from outside their locality that comes in the search of job and demand more than the localities. Lack of mindset for commercial approach (83.33%) and weak communication skills of the farmers (75.00%) were human resource challenges this is due to the reason that organised efforts are seems to be lacking in this. insufficient literature for agro tourism practice (87.50%) was a major technical challenge, less tourists during peak agricultural activities (80.00%) and Lack of governmental support (89.16%) were the situational and policy challenges faced by the farmers respectively, The probable reason for the above mentioned challenges might be that, since, the concept has emerged in the recent past, the proper research works have not been undertaken the policy recommendations have not been put forth before the government. Complete tourism package should be provided to encourage ATC (79.16%), ministry of tourism should support and promote ATC (75.83%) and provide sales and marketing support (75.00%) were few of the suggestions given by the farmers to overcome the challenges. The government need to come up with the price policy mechanism with respect to tour packages in order to prevent loss to farmers. If ATCs are promoted and widely adopted, it will provide supplementary income to the farmers and helps in generating the employment at the rural ecosystem.