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The response Pat got from FMI and his remarks about
it are quite informative.
If the USMA folks really do monitor this mailing
list, I strongly encourage them to try and find someone sympathetic inside FMI
(or a sympathetic lobbyist in the food industry) who can give us the "inside
scoop" as to the real reasons why certain individuals in FMI oppose voluntary
metric-only labelling. I think that is a necessary condition to craft a strategy
for turning them around or at least neutralizing them in the work to pass the
voluntary metric-only labelling amendment to the FPLA.
Ezra
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Friday, March 17, 2006 1:29
PM
Subject: [USMA:36284] Re: FMI Show
2006
On
18/03/06 2:54 AM, "Paul Trusten, R.Ph." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote:
The
Food Marketing Institute (FMI), a key opponent of the FPLA metric-only
labeling option amendment has said that it doubts U.S. consumers can
understand metric units. But, it apparently does not doubt the intellectual
capacity of U.S. consumers in a number of other areas. So, what gives, FMI?
Have a peek at the FMI 2006 Show brochure (attached).
Paul Trusten, R.Ph.
U.S. Metric Association,
Inc.
Dear Paul and All,
Last year I wrote to
the FMI.
Specifically I addressed my email to:
Elizabeth
Tansing <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Ty Kelley <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> and
to
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
I wrote as follows:
-----Original
Message-----
From: Pat Naughtin [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
Sent: Friday, August 26, 2005 4:38 PM
To:
Elizabeth Tansing; Ty Kelley; FMI FEEDBACK
Subject: Don't
use metric!
Dear Ty,
Elizabeth, and All,
I have just been reading the FMI web page
at http://www.fmi.org/gr/issues/gr_issues_display.cfm?id=113
and as you are deeply involved in the current metrication debate in
the USA, I thought that you might be interested in the article, 'Don't
use metric!' (at: http://www.metricationmatters.com/articles
). I recently visited the USA and I saw the quiet and unobtrusive, but
nevertheless rapid, progress that is being made toward use of the
metric system.
Cheers,
Pat
Naughtin
I also referred them to the article 'Costs of
non-metrication' at the same address: http://www.metricationmatters.com/articles
Ty Kelley replied:
Thanks for your e-mail. Yes, metric creep is happening here
in the United States, but Americans still embrace inches and pounds, feet,
yards, ounces, quarts and gallons, etc. So as long as Congress does not
mandate metric only for grocery items, FMI will be
happy.
This email was
unsigned.
Sadly, whenever I think of the FMI I also think of saboteurs
-- those people who used to throw wooden shoes (called sabots hence saboteurs)
into machinery in a futile attempt to prevent progress in manufacturing
industries in the 19th century.
Cheers,
Pat Naughtin
PO Box
305, Belmont, Geelong, Australia
Phone 61 3 5241
2008
Pat Naughtin is the editor of the free online monthly
newsletter, 'Metrication matters'.
You can subscribe by going to http://www.metricationmatters.com/newsletter
Pat
is the editor of the 'Numbers and measurement' chapter of the Australian
Government Publishing Service 'Style manual for writers, editors and
printers'. He is a Member of the National Speakers Association of Australia
and the International Federation of Professional Speakers. He is also
recognised as a Lifetime Certified Advanced Metrication Specialist (LCAMS)
with the United States Metric Association. For more information go to: http://metricationmatters.com
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