Remembering the Halal Committee of the Islamic Religious Affairs Council Myanmar Headquarters: IRAC's Halal Committee

Seeing the Halal logo of the Islamic Religious Affairs Council Headquarters online today brings back fond memories, filling me with warmth as I recall the official Halal logo representing the Islamic Council that I designed when I served as the Secretary of the Halal Committee.

A nostalgic sentiment arose: "Oh... the logo I designed still exists?"

If I am not mistaken, before the 16th Conference of the Islamic Religious Affairs Council Headquarters, I learned that the Department of Religious Affairs issued a Halal endorsement for honey through the Dhamma Thet Department, so I looked into it, though I was not fully satisfied. Since U Tin Win's duties might have been misreported, I would appreciate those with exact knowledge adding to this.

After the 16th Conference, when I became a Central Executive Member and discussed the matter with Ko Tin Maung Than and Ko Wunna Shwe, they suggested submitting a paper to the Central Executive meeting.

Therefore, I wrote and presented a paper, studying the Malaysia Halal Guidelines systematically to implement a Halal Processing Plan—which inspects step-by-step procedures including religious specifications aligned with modern systems, food sanitation systems, laboratory tests, and food production and storage—so that it could be put into action.

At that time, since the laboratory system could not yet be implemented systematically, we had to rely on the assistance of the Myanmar FDA. I remember we obtained assistance through Daw Ni Ni, who lived in the upper block of Maw Htaung Lay Lane. If anyone has precise details about this information, please feel free to correct and supplement it. Doctors took charge of the health aspects.

When conducting inspection field trips, we used four different forms, and inspections were typically carried out by a total of five members: a Council Halal Committee member, a doctor, a religious teacher, and two support team members.

Certificates of Halal endorsement were only permitted to be issued after presenting the evaluations obtained from these forms to the Executive Committee and securing their approval.

Step-by-Step Procedure:

• Business owners must submit an official application letter (incoming letter) requesting the inspection and issuance of a Halal recognition certificate.

• The committee sends a form to the business owner that allows them to fill in detailed information explaining each step of the food production process. (If necessary, we also collected sample products for laboratory testing, packaging designs, and ingredient lists.)

• Upon receiving this information, it must be presented to the Executive Committee so that an inspection team can be designated.

• The Executive Committee determines the list of members who will conduct the inspection alongside the Halal Committee.

• The inspection is led by the Committee Secretary or Vice Chairman. If necessary, we had to wait for laboratory test results.

• Sometimes, we found indications that the raw materials used in the products had already received Halal recognition certificates. To verify whether such indicated information was accurate, we had to inspect and confirm it either by obtaining endorsements directly from the respective raw material manufacturing factories or by contacting the organizations that issued their Halal recognition certificates via email.

• For example—ingredients such as chicken powder and oil used in ready-to-eat chicken noodles often came from abroad (Malaysia) already Halal-certified. We sometimes had to double-check such ingredients to be certain.

• Therefore, applying for a Halal Certificate from the Islamic Council usually took about 1 to 3 months.