Sunkist packer/shipper, with LoBue Farms, Inc. continuing its citrus growing and farm management business. It grows mostly navels on its 1,000 acres but also has some mandarins, grapefruit, blood oranges and a specialty citrus item called Sumo, which LoBue described as a cross of a navel orange, a grapefruit and a tangerine. As impressive as his business career is, LoBue has also left an out-sized mark on the many organization that he has served over the years. He announced his retirement from the Western Growers Board of Directors recently after 20 years of service. LoBue recalls that he first joined the Western Growers Board in 2000 when the Agricultural Producers Labor Committee merged with the much-larger trade association. He explained that Ag Producers, which was founded many years earlier, had a primary purpose of providing labor advice to citrus growers. Over the years, it expanded its suite of services to include health insurance, pensions plans and workers’ comp coverage. LoBue said merging with Western Growers was a great
idea. Initially, WG gave Ag Producers several at large board seats and then carved out a district for the citrus grower community, with LoBue representing that industry sector for two decades. Over the years, he was also a board member and chairman of California Citrus Mutual as well as the Citrus Avocado Pension Trust, and the California-Arizona Citrus League. He was also a founding director of a community bank and is active in many civic and church organizations. During his years of services, LoBue became very involved in the political arena taking many trips to both Washington, D.C., and Sacramento to lobby on behalf of the industry. “My greatest honor was getting to shake hands with President Ronald Reagan,” he said. He and his wife have four children, 12 grand children and one great grandchild. They have a second home in Morro Boy, which they occupy about one-third of the time and they love to travel by cruise ship. LoBue rattled off more than a dozen trips they have taken, including several of them
more than once. “When we enjoy a trip, we like to take it again,” he said. Though he has had a few disappointments and setbacks over his 80 years, LoBue has no regrets. “God has been very good to me,” he said. While he is exiting the industry as a full-time occupant, he remains committed to his farm and the industry at large. “I see innovation and technology being a big part of the future and solving some of the challenges we have,” he said. “That’s the only way we are going to stay in business. Labor and water are still the biggest issues. As someone once said, if you don’t have labor, you don’t have a water problem. And if you don’t have water, you don’t have a labor problem.” Speaking specifically of his efforts on behalf of the ag industry and his optimism for the future, LoBue said he has always been very impressed with how colleagues come together under the auspices of these industry organizations. “The big thing is how competitors mutually work together, partners in a common cause.”
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NOVEMBER | DECEMBER 2020
Western Grower & Shipper | www.wga.com
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