By Leo Quigley, AJOT“Capable management,” is reason number one why Connell Rice & Sugar Co., a division of The Connell Company, moved to the Port of Stockton’s Rough and Ready Island in 2000, and they’re staying there because they like the management at the port. Joseph Ravener, Senior Vice President of the company said, “We like their management. They have seven berths on Rough and Ready Island and each berth can handle 12,000 to 13,000 tons of rice. “We have excellent relationships with the port management, which are very good, and with the stevedores and truck unloaders,” he said. Other ports in the Sacramento Valley don’t have as much space, Ravener said, and they don’t have 35 feet of water. “We can bring in larger vessels and we have space, and, to date, the port has had no labor disruptions or other stoppages and everything works very nicely,” he said. Connell Rice & Sugar, launched in the early 1920s, operates globally and exports domestic rice as well as rice grown in the Far East and other regions worldwide to markets within the US, Asia, Africa and the Middle East. The rice shipped through the Port of Stockton is medium-grained Calrose rice, a variety of japonica rice developed in California. In February of this year, the company helped celebrate the shipment of the one millionth metric ton of bagged California rice through the port. SSA Marine loaded 13,000 metric tons of rice onto the M/V Blue Ocean, owned by AB Atlant trafik. The rice was shipped to Japan, which is a major market for Connell Rice & Sugar. Other California firms shipping rice through the port are American Commodities Corporation, CHS, Inc., Archer Daniels Midland, and Farmers Rice Cooperative. The rice was loaded using a spreader bar in swing bags. “That’s how we move medium grain rice in California,” Ravener said.