Maple 2000: Bringing the Maple World Together
by Mary Douglass

The joint annual meetings of the North American Maple Syrup Council (NAMSC) and International Maple Syrup Institute (IMSI) were held in Burlington this past October. As always, it was a time to renew relationships with friends and colleagues, learn new technologies and reinforce the wonderful heritage of our industry.

NAMSC's purpose, like that of MMSA, is to bring syrup makers together, to improve communication, to offer education and to support research. The board is made up of 16 directors representing each of the state and province member organizations in the sugar-making region. Our President, Larry Haigh, represented MMSA as the Michigan director. NAMSC directors shared crop reports and activities from each of their respective states and provinces. They also allocated funds collected through voluntary $.01 per container contributions to the NAMSC research fund. The council also agreed to begin work on revisions to the North American Maple Syrup Producers Manual that will hopefully produce a new, improved manual in several years.

IMSI differs from NAMSC in both make-up and purpose. While NAMSC is a producer organization, IMSI encompasses the whole of the maple syrup industry, including producer groups, syrup packers, equipment manufacturers, government regulators, researchers and educators. The role of IMSI is to promote and protect the pure maple product. I have been serving as the Michigan representative and Vice President of the IMSI. I was elected to serve as President beginning January 2001. I look forward to the challenges ahead and appreciate the opportunity to serve you.

The IMSI promotes industry self-monitoring to protect the "pureness" of maple syrup. For example, the IMSI was very active in responding to the lead crisis several years ago, including educating producers about lead concerns in equipment. From that, an equipment manufacturers group has formed to set standards for all manufactured equipment made for industry use. The IMSI also works with U.S. and Canadian regulators as necessary, to ensure fair and uniform standards for our products. In October, the IMSI resolved to urge government regulators and educators to educate and enforce laws prohibiting tap hole disinfectants.

The directors also voted to double their efforts in obtaining and testing maple syrup samples from store shelves around the world. This past summer, a sample obtained in Japan was found to contain no pure maple syrup. We are working with government agents to bring this to the attention of Japanese officials and will continue to pursue that case. We firmly believe our random testing serves as an important impediment to those who would undermine the pure, natural image of maple. All of these actions work to ensure that sugar-makers and packers throughout the maple region are making and bottling the best possible product.

The IMSI is also charged with promotion of maple syrup. With expanding production comes the need for an expanding market. While the IMSI has too few resources to finance major marketing campaigns, it has done small promotion projects over the years. The IMSI logo (you'll recognize part of it in our own MMSA logo) was originally introduced in 1976 as a symbol to ensure consumers of a pure, natural product. Our most recent promotion, introduced in October, is a colorful poster promoting pure maple syrup all over the world, all the time. Posters will be available to all MMSA members at the Annual meeting.

The roles of both the NAMSC and IMSI were discussed at length at these meetings, with both groups making a new commitment towards planning for our industry's future. NAMSC and IMSI are both beginning visioning/long-term planning that will allow each group to impact the future, instead of merely reacting to events along the way. It should be an interesting journey!