Rice farming couple turns family land into nationwide organic business venture
By CHRIS BARBEE
Agriculture is a family business. Always has been, always will be.

Lowell G. Raun Jr. and his wife Linda have received awards for their ef forts to not only continue the family tradition of growing rice, but to develop a field to market industry.

So it was not really to anyone's surprise when the 2006 Wharton County Youth Fair "Ag Man of the Year" award went to a couple - Lowell G. Raun Jr. and his wife Linda. After all, they are a team.

It was Linda Raun who accepted last year's "Ag Man" award. L.G., as most call him, was attending a niece's softball play-off game. Agriculture is important, but not as important as family.

"It is quite an honor to be part of the agriculture industry," Linda said in accepting the award. "The people are what make it so wonderful."

Wharton County is Texas' largest producer of rice and is one of the larger rice producing counties in the country. While rice acreage in the El Campo area is half what it was 20 years ago, it still covered 35,400 acres in 2006.

L.G. Raun is a third-generation rice farmer with a BBA from Texas A&M University. His father, Lowell Sr., was a big influence on his studies, encouraging him to learn the business end of agriculture since he'd grown up learning the production end.

Linda Raun also studied business at A&M, and later completed that college's Women in Agriculture business management program. After L.G. graduated, the Rauns returned to El Campo to become full-time rice farmers.

In 1989 the Rauns were looking for a way to diversify their commercial farming operation. The idea to grow rice organically began after traveling to the Northwest in 1988 and noticing the extensive use of organically grown products in restaurant and grocery stores (organically grown means without the use of commercial fertilizers or chemicals).

At the same time a new aromatic rice was released by the Rice Research Station in Beaumont. It was an interesting variety called Jasmine 85 (when cooked, Jasmine 85 rice has a natural nutty aroma and flavor). The couple decided that organically producing and marketing Jasmine 85 under their own brand name - Lowell Farms Organic Jasmine Rice - would be a unique way to diversify their operation.

They agreed that L.G. would handle the growing, and Linda would take care of the packaging, marketing and distribution.

In April or May 1989, L.G. planted 30 acres. They didn't have a package, a market or anything but a vision and faith. "In July, Lowell came home and said, 'You'd better get busy; we're going to have some rice to sell!'" Linda said.

Today the Rauns plant 50 acres of organic rice milled in both white and brown varieties, and another 300 acres is grown for them by other farmers to both spread the risk, since those farmers lease land in other areas, and so as not to deduct too much acreage from their commercial rice farming. They grow 2,000 acres of conventional long-grain varieties with L.G.'s brother, Tim, to carry on a Raun family tradition that began in 1915.

Lowell Farms Organic Jasmine Rice is certified "100% Organic" by the Texas Department of Agriculture.

Linda said to be "organic certified," the land must have not been subjected to normal farming practices for three years. She said they actually have 150 acres set aside for organic crops, but they rotate the land by using only about 50 acres each year.

Their product is now being sold in hundreds of stores in about 25 states and in Canada, and is packaged differently in some areas, such as in California, where it is cobranded with their distributor. The largest retail distributors are H-E-B, Kroger, Albertson's, Whole Foods Market, Rice Epicurean and Fiesta.

"The brown rice market has gone crazy! Five years ago we could hardly sell it," she said of a rise in health consciousness among Americans. She explained that brown rice is the result of milling. "Rough rice comes out of the field," she said, adding that the first milling results in brown rice, while white rice has had the bran milled off of it.

The Rauns will be planting their 19th crop this spring and will harvest in September.

If you ask L.G. about his organic rice he will proudly tell you, "We grow what we believe to be the finest rice in the world. Once you try our unique flavorful rice you will never go back to ordinary!"

Organic rice is only a part of the Raun's farming operation.

L.G. and Linda both serve on A&M's College of Agriculture Development Council, and L.G. also serves as vice chairman of the Texas Agricultural Summit Executive Committee, a group whose conference covers topics such as food safety, water conservation, natural resources and farm bills.

The couple have worked tirelessly to promote water conservation in the state. L.G. serves with the Lavaca Regional Water Planning Group and the Coastal Bend Groundwater Conservation District, and often travels to the nation's capital to carry rice industry issues to the federal level as chairman of the Texas

Rice Producers Legislative Group.

Linda is the Wharton County representative on the board of the Lower Colorado River Authority, appointed by Gov. Rick Perry. She also was appointed by President Bush to the Farm Service Agency's State Committee for Texas.

They have recently established a scholarship in their names at Texas A&M, and funded a rice research program at the Texas Agricultural Experiment Station at Eagle Lake.