Most Halal Products Lack Official Approval
The Jakarta Post, Jakarta | Thu, 02/10/2011 11:02 AM

Just over a third of all the halal products offered for sale in Indonesia actually have official halal certificates, according food and drug monitoring agencies.Only 41,495 products — 36.73 percent of all products registered at the Food and Drug Monitoring Agency (BPOM) — had official halal certificates, according to the BPOM. Lukmanul Hakim, the Indonesian Ulema Council’s (MUI) Food and Drug Analysis Agency chairman, said on Tuesday that there was lack of awareness among manufacturers about the need for halal certification.

Halal certification was needed to show that certain products could be safely consumed Muslims and to ensure that the products could be consumed by all people, regardless of religion, due to the healthy and nutritious ingredients and hygienic production process required for halal products,

According to government regulations on food labeling and advertising, every manufacturer or importer of products to be circulated in the Indonesian market had to declare that their consumable goods were halal.

Lukmanul Hakim said ,“Not all products with halal logos have official halal certificates. We still find many products improperly using halal logos, however. That just 357 products of 843 products surveyed by the agency in 2010 improperly displayed halal logos, meaning that they actually had no halal certificates”.. Lukmanul Hakim also said ,“that popular awareness of the importance of halal certifications for daily consumable goods had significantly increased”.

For the example from Chinese manufacturers. Awareness of Chinise manufacturers for halal certificates had increased sharply, that’s increased untik 21 %. And Lukmanul Hakim said “They may think that a halal certification will increase the competitiveness of their products in the Indonesian market”.

So, the official halal certificates is very important thing. And to many manufacturers must have a official halal certificates not just using a halal logos.