ARLINGTON, Va. — Leslie Sarasin was named president and chief executive officer of FMI – The Food Industry Association, in 2008, when it was still known as the Food Marketing Institute. In the 15 years since, she has led a remarkable rejuvenation of the organization, which now is an aggressive and effective advocate for a critically important industry. Moreover, FMI is on a growth path, expanding its membership and launching a new nonfoods community to support its members on issues related to the valuable categories of general merchandise, household goods, and health and beauty care.

Last year saw continued progress on a number of fronts, according to Sarasin. Not least important was the membership’s ability to come together to confront challenging issues.

“I am most proud of the way we have been able to assemble a diverse group of companies and individuals across the food industry to share ideas and innovations that improve our mission of providing safe, affordable, accessible and nutritious foods,” she said in a recent interview.

Leslie Sarasin

For starters, the association defined six priority issues — labor, food safety, payments, pharmacy/PBM reform, economy and feeding assistance. As a participant in the White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition and Health, FMI also committed to the food industry donating 2 billion meals last year, significantly more than it had ever done before.

Sarasin said the association has also made meaningful progress in advocating for changes to make the Food and Drug Administration’s Food Traceability Rule workable. That effort has involved meetings with FDA leadership, inviting officials to the FMI board meeting and taking FDA representatives to a distribution center.

With inflation still on the minds of shoppers, FMI continued its activities to explain food price changes, especially to policy makers, through media briefings, fact sheets, congressional forums and a satellite media tour that included more than 25 interviews in one day.

“There are a variety of external factors that impact costs at various stages of the supply chain that are beyond the control of food retailers, such as energy, labor and transportation,” Sarasin pointed out in responding to one critical report. “After a period of great volatility, we are now starting to see changes in some of these factors flow through to food pricing in 2024. The Department of Agriculture’s own data predicts that food inflation will continue to slow in 2024, decreasing by a projected 0.4%, while restaurant food prices are anticipated to increase 4.7%.”

Finally, last year saw the association expand its membership, adding 21 new retailers/wholesalers and universities/colleges as well as five new product suppliers.