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March 2012
Long-running halal meat issues finally settled by Hugh de Lacy The resultant deal “enables us to meet the requirements. . . of the [Muslim] world,” MIA chief executive Tim Ritchie told Canterbury Farming.
total output, with the rest going to another 25 countries, including India and China, which have substantial Muslim communities.
The row began in 2005 over the legitimacy of the slaughter practices in the 41 New Zealand works certified to produce meat to Muslim requirements, and resulted in that number declining to just two.
“That’s probably a slight overstatement, but certainly [it applies to] those big Muslim markets we trade with, whether they’re in the Middle East or Asia or even some of the other non-Muslim countries where there are significant Muslim populations
Indonesia alone takes over $100m worth of meat, though that is dwarfed by the $500m worth of halal dairy products that the giant New Zealand dairy company Fonterra exports to it.
These requirements include the animal being killed by having its throat cut while facing Mecca, and while the Muslim slaughterman says a prayer.
Malaysia is the base for the International Halal Integrity Alliance which is pushing for an international standard, and represents as much as 80% of the world halal trade.
To simultaneously meet western animal welfare standards, in New Zealand halal animals are electrically stunned before their throats are cut.
The New Zealand system, backed by certification and training of slaughtermen under the New Zealand Qualifications Authority, “has been held up as an example to the rest of the world,” Ritchie said.
A seven-year-long battle over access to the Malaysian halal meat market has finally been resolved with New Zealand now firmly recognised as a source of meat slaughtered to authentic Muslim standards.
New Zealand has pioneered halal slaughter but has met repeated stumbling blocks as rival Muslim countries and sects try to dominate international standards: before the Malaysians it was the Indonesians who raised objections to New Zealand’s methods. In 2005, unable to settle the issues with Malaysia, the Meat Industry Association (MIA) asked the Government to step in through the Ministries of Agriculture and Fisheries and of Foreign Affairs and Trade.
“Muslim communities around the world are striving to be the halal hub of the world, so there’s always been a problem ratcheting the standard.” While “You never say never,” the Malaysian deal may signal an end to the problems New Zealand halal meat exporters have faced. New Zealand’s total halal meat sales are now worth more than $500m a year, serving 20 Muslim countries which take about two-thirds of the
Since New Zealand first signed a halal slaughter contract with the newly-installed Islamic regime in Iran in 1979, the global market for halal certified food products has grown from virtually nothing to around $US550 billion a year. In 2010 Dr Hanif Quazi, the former AgResearch scientist at Lincoln who was a key figure in the development of halal standards here, warned Canterbury Farming readers that New Zealand was in danger of losing its hard-won leadership of the trade because of certification competition from Asian Muslim countries. In 1984 Quazi, a winner of Lincoln University’s prestigious International Alumni Medal, had a leadership role in the Federation of Islamic Associations of New Zealand’s efforts to establish a halal meat standard. Central to it was the electrical stunning of animals before their throats were
cut, something that attracted commendation from the United Kingdom’s powerful animal welfare lobby. As the trade grew, the Asians, led by the Indonesians and followed by the Malaysians, sought to corner a slice of it by challenging the New Zealand certification method. It’s taken considerable diplomatic effort to secure New Zealand’s system against opposition from Muslim countries which wonder how a Western country like New Zealand came to be the world authority on the trade. Ritchie said the MIA had lately been talking to a Malaysian-based organisation, the International Halal Integrity Alliance, which is pushing for an international standard. “They say there’s no contest with 70-80% of the trade, that everybody’s agreed and on the same wavelength. “But then there are different interpretations placed on some
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parts of it that can lead to challenges to its authenticity,” he said. Part of the Government’s response to the industry’s plea for help was to promulgate an official notice that halal practices form part of the Overseas Market Access Requirements (OMAR). “That’s the framework for our halal system, and it includes making sure the halal slaughtermen have received appropriate training,” Ritchie said. Meanwhile, the Government last month rejected a report from the Office of Ethnic Affairs (OEA) calling on it to promote halal tourism in New Zealand. Halal tourism was an ‘emerging opportunity’, the OEA said, adding that ethnic rights should be enshrined in a written constitution for New Zealand that entrenched ethnic rights.