Old measuring units to be abandoned

Starting next year, traditional measuring units like keun, majiki and pyong that have been popularly used among people will be officially abandoned.

Keun, which is used to weigh products, has been applied in different ways, with a keun meaning 600 grams for beef, 200 grams or 400 grams for fruit. The different applications caused confusion among consumers. Also, pyong caused confusion with the introduction of a concept called pyong hyong. One majiki, which is used in trading of rice paddies, refers to 150 pyong in Kyonggi Province, 200 pyong in Chungchong Province and 300 pyong elsewhere.

To prevent such confusion, the Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Energy (MOCIE) announced Tuesday that such measuring units would be blocked from use in commercial trade starting next year.

Merchants violating the regulation will be levied a 1 million won fine starting in June 2001. Also, makers of such measuring devices will be fined less than 5 million won.

The government is to enforce the use of meters, kilograms, square meters, centigrade, liters and cubic meters as official measuring units. Inches, feet, miles and yards are considered non-legal measuring units.

If you visit the ministry's web site at www.mocie.go.kr, you can obtain information about the government policy of measuring units, as well as legal measuring units, measuring systems and industrial standard, etc.

Lee Byong-Ki eye@donga.com