Issuance of halal certificates onlyrestricted to Jakim, State Islamic Religious Dept, minister says

Datuk Seri Jamil Khir Baharom says theissuance of halal certificates to the Department of Islamic DevelopmentMalaysia (Jakim) and the State Islamic Religious Department. ? Picture by SawSiow Feng

KUALA LUMPUR, March 19 ― The enforcement ofthe Trade Descriptions Act 2011 has managed to curb the issuance of fake halalcertificates to zero, the Dewan Rakyat was told today.

Minister in the Prime Minister's DepartmentDatuk Seri Jamil Khir Baharom said the Act which replaced the TradeDescriptions Act 1972 restricted authority in the issuance of halalcertificates to the Department of Islamic Development Malaysia (Jakim) and theState Islamic Religious Department.

"Previously through the Trade DescriptionsAct 1972, anyone could issue the certificate. Any private organisation andcompany could also issue certificates when they registered halal-relatedcompanies,” he said in response to an additional question from Siti Zailah MohdYusoff (PAS-Rantau Panjang).

He also said the government had nointention of setting up a special entity to take over the duties of Jakim andthe Halal Industry Development Corporation (HDC) in overseeing the issuance ofhalal certificates.

Both agencies he said, were already managingwell, with Jakim handling the issuance of halal certificates and HDC focusingon management, monitoring and coordination of industry players.

Jamil Khir said the two agencies alsoserved as a joint secretariat in the Malaysian Halal Council together with theDepartment of Standards Malaysia (DSM).

He said DSM was established to coordinatethe agencies involved either at the federal or state level to ensure thatMalaysia continued to lead in global halal and become a world reference centre.

“At the same time, the development of thenational halal industry can be synchronised to become more strategic, effectiveand comprehensive through development of a number of important components toproduce a holistic halal ecosystem,” he said.  

He was responding to a question from DatukNorah Abd Rahman (BN-Tanjong Manis) who wanted to know whether Jakim and HDCcould be consolidated so that matters related to halal certificate applicationwould be controlled by just one entity to avoid confusing foreign investors. ―Bernama

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