1.6. Agritourism in multifunctional development of rural areas 85 Jan Zawadka 1.6. AGRITOURISM IN MULTIFUNCTIONAL DEVELOPMENT OF RURAL AREAS Summary After the change of the political system and the transformation of the economy, which depended on abandoning the planned economy, in Poland emerged features that shown agriculture and rural areas maladjustment to the new state model and a market economy that was being implemented. By the end of the 1980s, the main features of agriculture and rural areas were resulting from development model realised over the years, whose main objective was the agricultural production. The new reality disclosed low economic efficiency of many farms and the necessity to reorient the concept of developing regions with monofunctional agricultural character to the concept of differentiating their economies. A key problem connected with ensuring rural population improvement of the standard of living is developing non-agricultural functions in rural areas. The generally unprofitable agricultural production must be supplemented, or even replaced by other non-agricultural functions, e.g. tourism, handicrafts or agri-food processing. The article presents the issue of multifunctional development of rural areas and agriculture in Poland. One of the elements of this development is tourism in rural areas, and the related agritourism, which is treated as an important branch of the non-agricultural activities, not only on a local, but also on a national scale. The paper shows the most important economic and non-economic benefits associated with the development of agritourism, as well as the threats arising from it for the rural areas. Keywords: agritourism, non-agricultural functions, rural areas, multifunctional development Introduction After the change of the political and economy system, in polish agriculture emerged features that showed its maladjustment to the new state model and market economy. Main features of farming and rural areas were the result of realised over the years development model, which fundamental goal was agricultural production. That is why the conception of regions with monofunctional character development states differentiating their economy, and a key issue concerned with providing local people better living standards is developing non-agricultural functions for rural areas. Unprofitable agricultural production must be supplemented and sometimes even substituted with other non-agricultural functions, e.g. tourism, craft, agri-food processing (Kłodziński and Rzeczkowska, 2000). Development of rural areas is understood as a process of improving the economic situation and living conditions of people residing in these areas, which should be accompanied by an increase in the range and quality of the goods (including public goods) delivered from rural areas to whole society. Development integrity of these areas depends on harmonious combination of elements such as: economic growth (including creation of new workplaces and increase in real incomes of the population), DOI: 10.18515/dBEM.M2014.n01.ch06