PARIS — French farmers ride their tractors into Paris from time to time to confront Parisians and the government with one complaint or another about agricultural issues, but on Sunday the French Young Farmers union instead brought the sights and scents of the countryside to Paris as its members covered a long stretch of the Champs-Élysée with miniature fields of wheat and sunflower.

“These Parisians, in the summer, they leave to go see the country,” said William Villeneuve, the president of the Young Farmers union. “We’re bringing them the country, on their avenue.”

It was perhaps its sheer incongruity that drew massive crowds to the avenue that the French call the most beautiful in the world. The federation said that about 150,000 plants covered more than 3 hectares, or 7.4 acres, of the avenue. Farms animals — sheep, pigs and at least four breeds of cows — were held in pens along the avenue.

French farmers have seen incomes plummet in recent years — in 2009, they sank 34 percent from 2008 levels — and have been vocal in their demands for government assistance. But organizers said the event was not meant as a political statement, but rather as an opportunity for city-dwellers to interact with farmers and the rural world.