Since agritourism is an amalgamation of agriculture and tourism, it alludes to the two industry’s combined challenges which influence the success of the business. Some of the challenges identified by the owners will be discussed in the following section.
The owners of Keisies Cottages have sold their farm as they feel they have no private life and the continuous hard work of running a farm, a gooseberry business and the farm cottages have motivated them to look for an alternative source of income. The owners furthermore experienced farming as intensely hard work with little reward at the end of the day as there is a general misconception about farmers11 in South Africa which have been created by popular media. Van Hoey Smith (2012) maintains that Vredendal Farm had to diversify into agritourism in order to survive, however this has put an end to relaxing over weekends with no time to go on holiday since there is no manager on the farm due to financial constraints. Alison Gilson (2012) supports the notion of the misconception which people have of farming, and even states that “people are willing to pay R100 000 more for a new vehicle every year, but are not willing to pay 10c more for a bunch of carrots”. At Tierhoek Farm the owners do go on holiday when it’s possible to do so, as they have Geduld Fortuin who has the skills and abilities to run the farm in their absence, but Alison and Bruce Gilson confirms that it is difficult to find the perfect time to go on holiday as there is always something that needs to be done on the farm.
Even though Tierhoek doesn’t experience any problems with their current permanent work force, the workers that are contracted in during peak periods do provide some challenges in terms of worker cohesion and conflict resolution. This challenge is furthermore compounded by a heavy work load due to delivery targets that need to be adhered to, and could lead to workers who get agitated and impolite towards visitors to the cottages. Worker relations at Keisies Cottages seem to be strained as Van Hoey Smith (2012) conveyed her frustration with the workers and their social issues during our conversations. Van Hoey Smith’s (2012) greatest challenge is to source reliable people who can do what they are supposed to do with minimum supervision as she has many different tasks to perform on a daily basis. Challenges identified by WWF (2010:23) reflect that employment in
11 Van Hoey Smith (2012) stated that farmers are seen as people who do not care about their workers,
agriculture has shifted from permanent employment to irregular, temporary employment, leaving workers and their families vulnerable with no form of security in the near future. Van Hoey Smith’s challenge to find suitable workers and many workers’ social issues are discouraging farmers to allow farm workers to stay on the farms, which leaves the families vulnerable.
Alison Gilson (2012) mentions that one of the greatest challenges that they faced when they started the agritourism business was the lack of information on the topic of agritourism and the support from any governmental organisation to assist in the start-up of this new venture. She commented on how she had to learn the hard way. According to Sharpley and Vass (2006:1050) the issue of support the public sector provides to agritourism ventures needs to be addressed and assistance should be directed towards the continuation rather than the start-up of business through regional marketing programmes or the development of local tourism business clusters. Any form of support would be invaluable to any agritourism business as it can be a very lonely industry, states Alison Gilson (2012). The owners of Tierhoek Cottages (2012) further comment that the Landbank does not want to provide loans to farmers who are interested in starting agritourism ventures, as it is outside the mandate of the bank to grant money for capital investments.
The challenges which the owners faced include employees and their social issues, lack of private time, misconception of farmers and farming in general and the lack of support from governmental organisations for agritourism businesses.
8. CONCLUSION
This chapter depicted the researcher’s findings in the form of two case studies and reflections to compare and elucidate some of the findings with the available international literature on agritourism. The aim of this chapter was to convey the narratives of two non-winemaking agritourism businesses with the specific focus on the non-financial benefits this form of diversification may
have for the workers on the farm. The financial benefits of agritourism have been implied throughout the case studies and the researcher acknowledges this important benefit. However, financial reasons are usually the first benefits of diversifying into agritourism, and the researcher elected to focus on additional (if any) benefits from agritourism activities in this study. The case studies were a convergence of information through conversations with the owners and workers, personal experience of the farms and the perceptions of visitors to the locations.
Benefits which have been identified include the potential role agritourism could play in educating consumers about the origin of fresh produce and the effort which farmers go through to provide the fresh produce. A further benefit is that agritourism destinations could act as an offset point for some of the local farmers’ produce, which may extend the benefits beyond the agritourism farm to other surrounding businesses. The third benefit which has been identified is the important role women play and how women are the focal point in this industry, moreover employment opportunities are created for local women through agritourism. The fourth benefit which the research has identified is the role agritourism could play in developing the workers on the farm in relation to their entitlements, capabilities and functionings as illustrated through Sen’s capabilities theory. The challenges which the agritourism business owners expressed are areas which should be addressed to enable growth of the agritourism industry over time.
Flyvbjerg (2006:221) states case study research can be problematic for two reasons. In this research study the findings of the case studies are context specific, and generalised conclusion could not be made by the researcher. The second reason, according to Flyvbjerg (2006:221) is context dependent knowledge will rule out the possibility of epistemic theoretical construction, which the researcher recognises.
According to Flyvbjerg (2011:301) an additional aspect which the researcher needs to keep in mind, is that case studies focus on the “relation to the environment” and the boundaries of the unit which is being studied needs to
be clear to indicate the context of the case. The boundaries of the particular units have been adhered to, and therefore further reason why the case studies cannot be generalised.
In the following chapter the researcher will draw conclusions from the research, which will subsequently inform the recommendations which the researcher will propose.