DALLAS, TX – With their two-year terms ending later this month, the chairs of two USA Rice governing boards handed their gavels to colleagues from other rice growing states. Fred Zaunbrecher, a rice and crawfish farmer from Acadia Parish in Louisiana was unanimously elected to serve as the new chair of the USA Rice Farmers Board of Directors, taking over from Texas’s LG Raun, and California rice farmer Josh Sheppard handed the reins of the USA Rice Council Board of Directors to Mississippi’s Carter Murrell who farms in Washington County.
The leadership changes come at crucial times for the rice industry. The Farm Bill, that is the purview of the Farmers Board, is still pending but inching closer to the finish line with key provisions being included in the Reconciliation Bill the Senate approved on Tuesday that is now in the House of Representatives.
The Rice Council oversees programming and spending on rice promotion, both domestically and internationally, including multi-million dollar grants from the USDA Foreign Agricultural Service to promote U.S. rice around the world. With import pressure on the rise, export opportunities in flux, and American preferences maturing, the Council will need to help the industry navigate these and other challenges.
These leadership changes take place against the backdrop of a struggling ag economy and extreme weather negatively impacting rice acres across the U.S. south that can have far reaching implications on the industry.
“If the Farm Bill provisions are passed and signed by the president in the next few weeks, it will be a feather in LG’s cap,” said Zaunbrecher. “But even if we have to keep working on it this year, LG has been instrumental in getting us into the strong position we are in, and I speak for the entire rice farming community when I extend our thanks and appreciation for his hard work.”
At the Rice Council meeting on Wednesday, Murrell acknowledged Sheppard’s leadership as well.
“The rice industry is facing strong headwinds in the marketplace,” he said. “But we grow a great product: versatile, sustainable, economically, and sought after. Josh has never taken his eye off that ball, and I inherit a Council that is set to build on years of success.”
The USA Rice Farmers Board also elected Missouri rice farmer Rance Daniels as vice chair. Each new appointee will serve a two-year term that begins August 1, 2025.