The Story of Agritourism
in Scotland

In Scotland, agritourism is defined as tourism or leisure on a real working farm, croft or estate producing food or fleece.

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Agritourism has always been present in Scotland. Many years ago, farms and crofts up and down the country would offer lodgings to travellers passing through. They might have helped on the farm in exchange for room and board for a night or two. In the years that followed, wealthy families from cities and towns would take a summer vacation on a farm, benefiting from fresh air, eating fresh produce, enjoying green spaces and a slower pace of life and through time, this became more accessible and affordable with the development of farmhouse bed and breakfasts; providing a base to explore the surrounding areas and an insight into the life of farming families.

Despite existing for hundreds of years before, agritourism didn’t have a name, or become a formally recognised sector in Scotland until this century.

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In 2008 Caroline Millar, an agritourism business owner, began having regular meetings with representatives of Scotland’s public agencies including Scottish Enterprise and Visit Scotland with half a dozen agritourism businesses leaders. The group would discuss how to gain recognition for agritourism as a sector and how this could be supported by other agencies at a national level.

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The concept of creating a brand for agritourism in Scotland was created by Caroline and sector colleagues in 2011, and a Scottish Government supported sector collaboration for agritourism was formed.

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2013 – 2015 saw the first guise of an agritourism network coming together in Scotland. It was really difficult to get a new initiative off the ground and ultimately there was not enough support to create a viable entity. Caroline continued to campaign, to meet MSPs and to talk about and create an identity for Scotland’s agritourism sector

In 2014, the first Scottish Agritourism Monitor Farm Programme began. Funded by the Scottish Government, this was a peer-to-peer support and knowledge exchange programme focused on developing agritourism businesses across Scotland. The Gin Bothy – a multimillion-pound international brand, was borne out of this programme.

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The second monitor farm programme was funded by the Scottish Government in 2019.  Between these two agritourism monitor farm programmes, the noise that had been created over the years, the doors that had been knocked on, the initial attempts to get a formal group together, there was a great bunch of people, with agritourism and farm retails businesses, getting to know each other, meeting in person regularly, all over Scotland, sharing knowledge, peer to peer support and the beginnings of a network was there.

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Then two major things happened in 2020. The first being that agritourism appeared in the Scottish National Party manifesto as a strategic priority which really put the sector on the national government radar.  And then of course March 2020, and the arrival of Covid-19 in Scotland brought a huge blow to a group of businesses who are relying on visits from members of the public for their livelihood.   

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The Scottish agritourism sector immediately came together on the first day of UK lockdown in March 2020. A virtual meeting was attended by over 100 agritourism business owners and online meetings continued every Monday throughout the pandemic. These meetings helped people to air their issues amongst peers and to know they weren’t alone.

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Caroline offered support, gathering concerns and data from the sector and taking key questions to Scottish Government or directly to the Scottish Tourism Alliance and latterly through the Scottish Tourism Emergency Response Group. There was also extensive one to one personal support either by phone or e-mail and a WhatsApp group for day to day sharing was established which built quickly to 150 active participants.

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Many of the agritourism and farm retail businesses in the unofficial network faced financial pressures from loans taken to fund agritourism businesses and time was spent signposting people to grants and support. Where specific individuals fell through cracks, they were put in touch with local MPs and MSPs.

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In June of 2020, the Scottish Government asked the group to formalise in order to be recognised for official support. The sector body and membership organisation, Scottish Agritourism, was created under the umbrella of the Scottish Tourism Alliance; coming out from the umbrella as a stand-alone organisation in March 2022. Caroline Millar took the role of Sector Lead.

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At the first [in person] Scottish Agritourism Conference in November 2021, Mairi Gougeon, Scotland’s Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs, launched a government backed Scottish national strategy for agritourism with a KPI for growing the value of the sector overall.

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The group who are now implementing that strategy (Scotland’s National Agritourism Strategy Board), are all the agencies that could only be imagined back in 2008, now they are all round the table in person, 3 or four times a year, co-chaired by Caroline and Ms Gougeon. They include the three Scottish enterprise agencies (Scottish Enterprise, South of Scotland Enterprise and Highlands and Islands Enterprise), Visit Scotland, Scottish Government, Scottish Agritourism, the Crofting Commission and SLAED - Scottish Local Authorities Economic Development Group.

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Some of the KPIS in the strategy included

• Increase sector value to £250 million by 2030 from £170 million (agritourism is currently estimated at £60 million and farm retail at £110 million)

• 1000 farms or crofts actively in agritourism (including farm retail) by 2030 – this was 531 at the strategy launch and is around 880 today

• 50% of the 1000 farms and crofts will offer their own food or drink to visitors as part of an experience or a stay.​ This is a big focus with huge challenges as more red tape emerges and abattoirs close

• Visitor numbers to farms and crofts to increase from an estimated 1,598,948 to 2 million by 2030

• Increase the number of Travel Trade ready agritourism businesses from 15 to 40 by 2030.

 

In September 2025, a sector census was undertaken to measure progress towards KPI targets, and the following KPIs were noted to be met and exceeded.

• Increase sector value to £250 million by 2030 from £170 million (agritourism is currently estimated at £60 million and farm retail at £110 million).

 

The current overall sector value is estimated at £155.5 million for purely agritourism activities and £137.4 million for farm retail.  Combined, the current sector value is estimated to be £292.9 million.

• Visitor numbers to farms and crofts from estimated 1,598,948 to increase to 2 million by 2030.

 

Agritourism businesses reported over 2.5 million day-visitors and almost 200,000 overnight visitors. Farm retail businesses reported over 2.5 m day visitors.

• Increase participation in being Travel Trade ready from 15 to 40 by 2030.

 

The number of travel trade ready businesses is 89 (at February 2026).

 

Find out more about Scottish Agritourism.

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