To get a proper grip on the workings of the food industry, it is vital to understand the units that are used to organise and quantify production. Since this website sets out to cover historical aspects of food production, it is only fair to offer a brief outline of the systems in place during the formative years. We live in a metric world and should not imagine that any other set of measures is going to return to re-establish the status quo ante. But we need to have a clear idea of how we started.
The starting point for present purposes is the 1824 Weights and Measures Act, for reasons which will be made clear to subscribers in a fuller treatment of the topic. It will come with a basic tool kit for managing the practical aspects of modern metrology. For seekers of the arcane, visit Wikipedia’s excellent listing of the many post Sumerian systems and notations for weights, here. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ancient_Mesopotamian_units_of_measurement)