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Omarah - The Halal Journey, Kuala Lumpur (2026)

السَّلاَمُ عَلَيْكُمْ وَرَحْمَةُ اللهِ وَبَرَكَاتُهُ

بِسْـــــــــمِ اَللّهِ الرّحْمن الرّحيم

The halal industry offers significant opportunities, driven by the increasing global Muslim population and rising demand for halal-certified products. With the expanding consumer base, businesses can tap into diverse markets, ranging from food and beverages to cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, and even financ

e. The halal certification provides companies with a competitive edge, allowing them to cater to the ethical and dietary needs of Muslim consumers while fostering trust and loyalty. Contributing to the halal industry involves ensuring compliance with halal standards and regulations, promoting sustainability, and educating both businesses and consumers. Consultants and industry experts play a vital role in guiding companies through the certification process, as well as offering strategic insights into market trends. By innovating and advocating for halal-compliant solutions, businesses can enhance their market reach while ensuring ethical production practices. The halal industry represents a thriving sector with vast potential for growth and positive impact on the global economy. Selawat dan Salam buat junjungan besar Nabi Muhammad ﷺ:
Salawat and Salam for The Prophet ﷺ:

اَللهُمَّ صَلِّ عَلَى سَيِّدِنَا مُحَمَّدٍ وَعَلَى آلِ سَيِّدِنَا مُحَمَّدٍ

Zikir Penghapus Dosa:

Istighfar - اَسْتَغْفِرُ الله الْعَظِيْمِ
Tasbih - سُبْحَانَ اللَّهِ
Tahmid - الْحَمْدُ لِلَّهِ
Takbir - اللَّهُ أَكْبَرُ
Tahlil - لَا إِلَٰهَ إِلَّا ٱللَّٰهُ

لاَ إِلَهَ إِلاَّ اللَّهُ وَحْدَهُ لاَ شَرِيكَ لَهُ لَهُ الْمُلْكُ وَلَهُ الْحَمْدُ وَهُوَ عَلَى كُلِّ شَىْءٍ قَدِيرٌ

جَزَاكُمُ اللهُ خَيْرًا كَثِيْرًا وَجَزَاكُمُ اللهُ اَحْسَنَ الْجَزَاء

إن شاء الله

07/09/2026

FROM CERTIFICATION TO CULTURE:
BUILDING INTERNAL HALAL ASSURANCE SYSTEMS (HAS) AS A CONTINUOUS BUSINESS PROCESS RATHER THAN A COMPLIANCE EXERCISE

1. For most Malaysian food SMEs, the logo is treated as a finish line. The certificate is framed, the audit file is archived, and operations quietly revert to business as usual until the next renewal cycle forces everyone to scramble again. This certificate as endpoint mentality is precisely what a genuine Halal Assurance System (HAS) is designed to prevent, yet it remains the default posture across much of the industry. The distinction matters more than it may first appear: a HAS built for compliance produces paperwork, while a built into organisational culture produces integrity that survives the auditor's departure.

2. Malaysia's regulatory architecture already signals this intent. Under the Manual Prosedur Pensijilan Halal Malaysia ( ) 2020 and the Halal Management System ( ) 2020, JAKIM does not merely certify a product it obliges applicants, particularly multinational category applicants, to operationalise a documented assurance system before certification is even granted, alongside ongoing surveillance audits, compliance monitoring, and enforcement powers under the Trade Description (Certification and Marking of Halal) Order 2011. Yet recent industry analysis suggests the system is still experienced by many as a bureaucratic gate rather than a management discipline: manpower shortages, auditor skill gaps, and recurring friction with the portal continue to slow certification and recertification alike.

3. What separates a living HAS from a filing exercise is visible in the criteria themselves. LPPOM's HAS 23000 framework, a close regional counterpart to Malaysia's own system, requires internal audits at least twice yearly and an annual management review but the more telling requirement is what happens after a weakness surface. Organisations are obliged to identify the root cause, set a corrective target date, and demonstrably prevent recurrence, not simply close the finding. That single design choice root cause correction over box ticking is what converts an assurance system from a static checklist into an iterative management loop.

4. Where the shift from compliance to culture becomes most concrete is at the level of the Halal Assurance Team (Ahli Jawatankuasa Halal Dalaman) and the internal audit function it runs. Industry training providers now explicitly position internal halal auditing as a strategic capability rather than a clerical one proactively surfacing gap before an external audit does, and, in doing so, moving halal management "from a passive certificate to an active, continuously improving system". This reframes the internal auditor's role: not a document keeper preparing for JAKIM's visit, but a standing feedback mechanism that feeds real operational data back into management decisions year-round. Earlier survey-based research on halal executives reached a similar conclusion from the opposite direction SMEs that treat continuous monitoring and internal documentation as a genuine in-house discipline, rather than an externally imposed one, are the ones that sustain compliance between audit cycles.

5. This is also where management commitment does the real work. Studies on SME halal certification consistently point to the same triad of success factors visible top management commitment, sustained employee training, and disciplined financial and material record keeping as the difference between SMEs that certify once and struggle to maintain standards, and those that treat halal assurance as embedded infrastructure. None of this triad is captured by a certificate on the wall; all three require ongoing investment, which is precisely the behaviour a compliance mindset tends to discourage once the certificate is secured.

6. There is also a wider governance argument gaining traction regionally. A recent commentary from frames halal product assurance not as a religious formality but as a gateway into broader industrial governance positioning it alongside ISO management standards, aligned with Environmental, Social, and Governance ( ) expectations, and connected to the Sustainable Development Goals agenda. Read this way, a mature HAS is less a religious compliance artefact and more a trust infrastructure one that happens to also satisfy Muslim consumers, but whose real commercial value lies in the traceability, accountability, and continuous improvement discipline it forces onto the organisation.

7. For Malaysian halal food SMEs eyeing export markets, the practical implication is straightforward: the internal audit and management review cycle should not be scheduled around JAKIM's calendar it should be scheduled around the business's own. Root cause correction, not renewal driven documentation sprints, should be the default response to any gap. Halal Assurance Team capacity should be treated as a recurring line item, not a one-time appointment. As the global halal market continues its path toward an estimated USD 1.67 trillion by 2025, the SMEs positioned to capture that growth will not be the ones with the most polished certificate they will be the ones whose assurance system has quietly become how they run the business, every day, whether or not an auditor is watching.

Reference:

Abu Bakar, M., Noor, A. M., Ismail, S., Shahrom, N. F. N., Talib, N. M., & Hashim, N. (2025). Halal food industry in Malaysia: Key challenges and the path forward. International Journal of Entrepreneurship and Management Practices, 8 (29), 400-414. Doi: 10.35631/IJEMP.829027

ChemLinked. (2025). Interview with JAKIM on Malaysia's Halal Certification for Cosmetics. Retrieved from https://cosmetic.chemlinked.com/news/interview/interview-with-jakim-on-malaysias-halal-certification-for-cosmetics

Daud, M. Z., Zarmani, N. F., & Tumiran, M. A. (2021). Analysis of halal assurance management on imported food products in Malaysia. International Journal of Halal Ecosystem and Management Practices, 1(1), 8-19. Doi: https://doi.org/10.35631/IJHEMP.11002

Hassan, M. H., Arif, S., & Sidek, S. (2015). Knowledge and practice for implementing internal halal assurance system among halal executives. Asian Social Science, 11(17), 57-57. Doi: https://doi.org/10.5539/ass.v11n17p57?urlappend=%3Futm_source%3Dresearchgate.net%26utm_medium%3Darticle

Hidayati, L., Cheumar, M., Sucipto, S., & Juliana, J. (2024). Integrating halal assurance and quality management: A strategic framework for sustainable growth in the food industry. Industria: Jurnal Teknologi dan Manajemen Agroindustri, 13(2), 239-254. Doi: https://dx.doi.org/10.21776/ub.industria.2024.013.02.8

LPPOM Halal Certification. (2026). Toward Sustainable Industrial Governance: Integrating Halal, Quality, and Ethics. Retrieved from https://halalmui.org/toward-sustainable-industrial-governance-integrating-halal-quality-and-ethics/

Puspaningtyas, S. D., Sucipto, S., & Santoso, I. (2023). Barriers of integration halal assurance system and quality management system. Global Journal Al -Thaqafah, 13(1), 27-40. Doi: https://doi.org/10.7187/GJATSI072023-3

To gain deeper insights into the certification process, ChemLinked spoke with Mr. Muhyidin bin Aziz @ Saari, Director of the Halal Management Division at JAKIM, who shared valuable perspectives on ingredient requirements, certification requirements, halal labeling, and key compliance recommendations...

24/08/2026

HALAL HOTEL CERTIFICATION STANDARDS:
BENCHMARKING GLOBAL PRACTICES AND THE CASE FOR A UNIFIED INTERNATIONAL RATING SYSTEM

1. The global hospitality sector has evolved considerably beyond its origins in food compliance, expanding into a multidimensional discipline that now governs prayer facilities, gender sensitive amenities, financial arrangements, and service delivery models grounded in principles. A systematic review spanning studies published between 2011 and 2025 confirms that Muslim friendly and Shariah compliant hotels have become an increasingly prominent focus within the hospitality literature, reflecting steady academic engagement with a sector that continues to grow in both scale and complexity. Yet this maturation has not been matched by regulatory coherence. As halal tourism expands from its traditional strongholds in Malaysia, Indonesia, and the into non-OIC markets across , , and the , hoteliers, certifying bodies, and travellers are increasingly confronted with a patchwork of standards that vary sharply in scope, rigour, and recognition.

2. The absence of a single authoritative benchmark has produced a fragmented certification landscape. National schemes such as 's administered halal standard have historically concentrated on food and beverage outlets, with comparatively limited regulation extending to full property compliance covering accommodation and broader service delivery. Elsewhere, private rating systems such as have emerged to fill gaps left by government certification bodies, offering a tiered classification commonly described as Gold, Silver, and Bronze that distinguishes hotels fully aligned with Islamic principles from those offering only partial Muslim friendly accommodations. While such market driven systems have improved consumer navigability, they operate independently of state backed halal authorities, creating parallel and occasionally inconsistent signals of trustworthiness for the same property.

3. At the intergovernmental level, the Standards and Metrology Institute for Islamic Countries ( ), operating under the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, has attempted to address this fragmentation through the OIC/SMIIC 9 Halal Tourism Services Standard. This standard provides guidelines for managing halal tourism facilities, products, and services, and notably classifies accommodation premises into three tiers Advanced, Medium, and Basic Scale Services based on the depth of halal compliant offerings provided. Its design explicitly accommodates properties located in both and non-OIC regions, positioning it as one of the more ambitious attempts at cross border harmonisation. However, adoption remains uneven; SMIIC's own reporting to the Follow-up Committee acknowledges that consistent application of OIC/SMIIC standards across accreditation bodies is still an evolving objective rather than an accomplished fact, with mutual recognition arrangements between member states only beginning to formalise in recent years.

4. Empirical research into hotel level implementation reinforces the scale of the challenge. Studies examining halal compliance in hotel kitchens have found that operational integrity and guest trust are frequently undermined by limited managerial awareness, regulatory complexity, and inconsistent commitment among hotel operators, even where certification has nominally been obtained. Staff turnover, the continuous training burden required to maintain compliance, and the difficulty of balancing certification standards against competitive service quality against conventional hotels compound these operational pressures. Perhaps most tellingly, a substantial share of properties marketed as friendly operate without any formal halal certification at all, a gap that has been shown to raise credibility concerns and erode the very consumer trust that certification is meant to secure.

5. The consequences of this inconsistency extend beyond individual hotel operations into the broader tourism economy. Halal tourism attributes developed within Islamic majority countries have been shown to transfer poorly to non-Islamic markets, where local regulatory environments, supply chains, and consumer expectations differ substantially. This mismatch complicates efforts by destination countries seeking to position themselves competitively within the global Muslim travel market, since properties certified under one national or private scheme may hold little recognisable value to travellers accustomed to a different standard. The absence of standardised guidelines has been repeatedly identified in the literature as a central barrier to sector growth, alongside the high cost of transitioning to Shariah compliant operations and the continuing scarcity of personnel trained in Islamic hospitality principles.

6. The case for a unified international rating system rests on addressing precisely these frictions. A harmonised framework whether built upon an expanded OIC/SMIIC 9 mandate or a hybrid model incorporating recognised private sector benchmarks would allow hotels to signal compliance in a manner intelligible to travellers regardless of country of origin or destination, while reducing the duplicative certification costs currently borne by international hotel groups operating across multiple jurisdictions. Institutional theory offers a useful lens here: as halal certification diffuses across an increasingly global hospitality field, isomorphic pressures toward shared norms and structures tend to strengthen legitimacy and reduce uncertainty for both operators and consumers, a dynamic well documented in organisational sociology and directly applicable to the standardisation challenge facing halal hospitality today.

7. Realising this vision, however, requires reconciling structural tensions that have so far limited progress. Harmonisation efforts must accommodate the differing regulatory capacities of OIC and non-OIC states, the varying doctrinal interpretations applied by national fatwa authorities, and the commercial interests of established private rating bodies that have built market recognition independently of government schemes. SMIIC's continued technical committee work, including recent training and awareness programmes conducted across member states, suggests institutional appetite for convergence, but translating standards documents into consistently enforced, mutually recognised accreditation remains a multi-year undertaking rather than an imminent outcome.

8. For the halal hospitality sector to fulfil its dual promise serving the faith-based needs of Muslim travellers while remaining commercially appealing to a broader global market sustained investment in coherent certification, workforce competency development, and closer collaboration between policymakers, standards bodies, and industry practitioners is indispensable. A unified international rating system will not emerge from any single institution acting alone; it will require the kind of coordinated, evidence-based standardisation effort that the tourism and hospitality research community has increasingly called for, and that the industry's own credibility now depends upon.

References:

Abdul Karim, N., Azeman, A. S., Mahamad Ali, F., Noor Iskandar, N. S., & Mohd Ariffin, N. A. (2022). Halal standard: Issues in hotel industry. Journal of Fatwa Management and Research, 27(2-SE), 17-36. DOI: https://doi.org/10.33102/jfatwa.vol27no2-SE.481

Abdullah, S. R., Sadek, D. M., Ismail, I. A., Bakar, A. Y. A., Said, S., Doktoralina, C. M., Abdullah, M. M. N. (2025). Enhancing halal compliance: The critical role of certification awareness in strengthening managerial commitment in hotel kitchens. International Journal of Research and Innovation in Social Science, 9(26), 751-8757. DOI: https://dx.doi.org/10.47772/IJRISS.2025.903SEDU0661

Razalli, R., Yusoff, R. Z., & Mohd, R. M. W. (2024). A framework of halal certification practices for hotel industry. Asian Social Science. 9(11), 316-316. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5539/ass.v9n11P316?urlappend=%3Futm_source%3Dresearchgate.net%26utm_medium%3Darticle

Wan Kamarudin, W. N. B., Dzia-Uddin, D. N., Sofiani, S., & Ritonga, R. M. (2025). Muslim-friendly hotels and hospitality practices: A comprehensive review of global trends and challenges. International Journal of Social Science Research. 13(2), 178. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5296/ijssr.v13i2.23163

Halal Standard: Issues In Hotel Industry Authors Noraida Abdul Karim Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM) Ainnin Sofea Azeman Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM) Faliza Mahamad Ali Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM) Nadir Syafika Noor Iskandar Nur Ainina Mohd Ariffin Four Finger Outlet DOI: https://doi.org/1...

17/08/2026

CROSS-CONTAMINATION RISKS IN SHARED PRODUCTION FACILITIES:
COMPLIANCE CHALLENGES FOR MULTI-CATEGORY FOOD MANUFACTURERS

1. For a growing share of the world's food manufacturers, halal is no longer a niche production line it is a parallel operating standard running through facilities that were never designed with religious segregation in mind. As demand for halal certified goods expands well beyond Muslim majority markets, an increasing number of multi category producers are attempting to serve halal and non-halal segments from the same physical footprint. The economics are compelling: shared equipment, shared warehousing, and shared logistics defer the capital cost of a dedicated plant. But halal status is not merely a formulation attribute confirmed at the point of ingredient sourcing it is a condition that must survive contact with the entire production environment. A single shared conveyor, storage tank, or delivery vehicle can quietly undo weeks of certified compliance, and the resulting failure rarely announces itself until an audit, a recall, or a customer complaint forces the issue into the open.

2. The mechanics of the risk are well documented in the halal food safety literature. Contamination can occur at virtually any node of the value chain mixing vessels, slicing equipment, storage racks, transport containers, and even packaging lines that alternate between halal and non-halal runs without adequate changeover protocols. Guidance from halal certification bodies is consistent on this point: where dedicated lines are not feasible, validated cleaning and sanitation procedures must demonstrably remove all residue of prohibited substances before halal production resumes, and physical or temporal segregation must be documented, not assumed given that residue from non-halal products can remain on equipment surfaces without validated sanitation procedures, and that shared facilities are permitted under halal guidance only when measures are in place to prevent contact between halal and non-halal foods. What separates the manufacturers who manage this successfully from those who do not is rarely intent it is the rigor of the control system standing between shared infrastructure and shared risk.

3. The commercial stakes of getting this wrong are considerable and increasingly quantifiable. Analysis of the B2B food manufacturing sector has linked certification failures directly to production environment weaknesses, noting that shared facilities increase cross-contamination risk and often require costly retrofits or dedicated plants that smaller manufacturers, reliant on co-packers, cannot always afford. The reputational exposure compounds the financial one: one widely cited case saw a manufacturer absorb roughly two million dollars in recalls and lost contracts after non-halal gelatin was discovered in a certified product, an outcome traced back to inadequate segregation controls in the supply and production chain. In the , regulatory audit data has quantified the scale of the problem at a national level a 2024 Food Standards Agency report attributed 15% of halal certification audit failures to cross-contamination risk, disproportionately affecting facilities producing both halal and non-halal lines, while a separate industry audit found that 12% of non-compliance cases specifically involved shared storage arrangements. These figures point to a structural, not incidental, vulnerability wherever halal and conventional production share physical space.

4. Academic and regulatory literature increasingly frames this as a systems problem rather than a hygiene checklist. A 2025 review published in Foods examining the halal meat supply chain observed that Industry 4.0 technologies including , digital twins, and big data analytics remain underexplored as tools for addressing cross-contamination, fraud, and traceability gaps, despite their growing use elsewhere in food production, suggesting that the sector's control infrastructure has not kept pace with the complexity of shared-facility operations. Complementary findings from halal supply chain research echo the same conclusion at the input stage, with dedicated facilities and validated cleaning protocols identified as essential elements of certification integrity, alongside staff training and a designated compliance function responsible for audits and non-conformity resolution. Post market surveillance work published in the Journal of Food Protection has separately confirmed that forbidden substances continue to surface in certified products after certification is granted, underscoring that a onetime audit approval is not equivalent to ongoing contamination control.

5. For Malaysian manufacturers, this challenge sits directly within the compliance architecture administered by . The Malaysian Halal Certification Procedure Manual (MPPHM 2020) and MS1500:2019 both treat production environment integrity as a certification pillar rather than a supporting document, and JAKIM's inspection regime is explicit that facility level segregation, not just ingredient documentation, is subject to audit. This is reinforced by the Malaysian Halal Management System ( 2020), whose newest amendment tightens the operational bar further: the 2020 (Amendment 2026), effective 1 April 2026, introduces eight specific compliance changes concentrated in surveillance monitoring and raw material certification requirements, meaning manufacturers operating shared facilities must now reconcile existing Halal Assurance System documentation against a materially stricter surveillance framework before their next audit cycle. For in particular many of which rely on shared or third party co-manufacturing arrangements to remain cost competitive this shift raises the practical bar for what "adequate segregation" is deemed to mean, and narrows the margin for informal or undocumented cleaning routines that may have passed muster under earlier guidance.

6. Co-manufacturing arrangements deserve specific attention here, since they represent one of the fastest growing points of halal risk exposure for multi category producers. Because halal status extends beyond ingredients to production method and facility practice, certification bodies increasingly require co-manufacturers to demonstrate the same segregation rigor as vertically integrated halal producers including physical separation of production lines where feasible, and documented, auditable cleaning validation where lines must be shared. Brand owners who outsource production without verifying these controls at the facility level are, in effect, importing an unmanaged compliance liability into their own certification. This is precisely the gap that trips up otherwise well intentioned manufacturers: certification is frequently pursued at the brand or product level while the physical facility where production actually occurs remains under scrutinized.

7. What emerges from this evidence base is a clear operational imperative rather than a theoretical concern. Multi category manufacturers operating shared facilities need contamination control built into the workflow itself validated cleaning in place protocols with documented verification, clear physical or temporal segregation of halal runs, traceable equipment uses logs, and a designated internal function empowered to flag non-conformities before they reach a certifying auditor. Digital monitoring tools, still underused relative to their potential, offer a credible path to closing the gap between point in time audit compliance and continuous operational assurance. As halal certification tightens globally and buyers grow more selective about supplier segregation practices, the manufacturers best positioned to compete will be those treating shared facility risk not as a cost of doing business, but as a control system worth engineering properly from the outset.

References:

American Halal Foundation. (2026). Guide to Understanding Cross Contamination in Halal Certification. Retrieved on Jan 1, 2025 from https://halalfoundation.org/cross-contamination-in-halal-certification/

Ellahi, R. M., Wood, L. C., Khan, M., & Bekhit, A. E.-D. A. (2025). Integrity challenges in halal meat supply chain: Potential industry 4.0 technologies as catalysts for resolution. Foods, 14(7), 1135. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3390/foods14071135

Mahama, S., Waloh, N., Chayutsatid, C., Sirikwanpong, S., Ayukhen, A., Marnpae, M., Nungarlee, U., Petchareon, P., Munaowaroh, W., Khemtham, M., Ngamukote, S., Nopponpunth, V., Dahlan, W. (2020). Postmarket laboratory surveillance for forbidden substances in halal-certified foods in Thailand. Journal of Food Protection. 83(1). 147-154. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4315/0362-028X.JFP-19-051

Supian, K. (2018). Cross-contamination in processing, packaging, storage, and transport in halal supply chain. In book: Preparation and Processing of Religious and Cultural Foods, 309-321. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-08-101892-7.00016-X

The Halal Times. (2025). Cross-Contamination Prevention in UK Halal Food Production. Retrieved on June 26, 2025 from https://www.halaltimes.com/cross-contamination-prevention-in-uk-halal-food-production/

The Halal Times. (2025). The Importance of Halal Compliance in B2B Food Manufacturing. Retrieved on May 21, 2025 from https://www.halaltimes.com/the-importance-of-halal-compliance-in-b2b-food-manufacturing/

Learn how to prevent cross-contamination in halal certification. Get expert tips on maintaining halal integrity in production, storage, and..

10/08/2026

DEVELOPING COMPETENCY FRAMEWORKS FOR HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT

1. The global halal economy, now approaching a trillion-dollar valuation across food, cosmetics, pharmaceuticals and logistics, has outpaced the workforce infrastructure meant to sustain it. Certification bodies can approve a facility, an ingredient list, or a slaughter process, but none of that holds without the people executing it daily on the factory floor. This is the quiet gap in halal governance: standards have matured faster than the human capital systems designed to operationalize them. A recent bibliometric review of the halal ecosystem's talent literature found a marked surge in publications after 2020, yet noted that integration between ethical perspectives and mainstream human capital theory remains limited despite the field's growing strategic importance amid digital transformation and global sustainability goals. Malaysia, as the architect of :2019 and the certification scheme, sits at the centre of this conversation not because its standards are incomplete, but because the competency frameworks meant to translate those standards into daily practice are still being assembled in real time.

2. Malaysia's regulatory answer has been the mandatory designation. Under the Manual Procedure for Malaysia Halal Certification, any Muslim staff member appointed to this role must hold a Diploma in Halal Management, or at least five years of relevant experience, alongside a Halal Executive Certificate issued by the Halal Professional Board under JAKIM. This is a structural acknowledgment that halal assurance is a human resource function first and a documentation exercise second. Yet the eligibility criteria describe a credential, not a competency model they specify who may occupy the role without fully specifying the layered skill set the role demands. That distinction matters, and recent scholarship has begun to close it.

3. A 2025 conceptual model published for halal executives in food manufacturing offers one of the clearer articulations of what full competency should look like. The framework argues that a genuinely comprehensive core-competency model serves three simultaneous purposes: preparing future halal executives for the role, evaluating their performance once in post, and structuring their long-term professional development, with the explicit intent that the same competency architecture could inform how other countries build their own halal related human resource systems. This reframes the Halal Executive not as a compliance checkbox but as a career pathway requiring deliberate development a shift with direct implications for how HR departments design recruitment, appraisal, and succession planning around the role.

4. Complementary work from Darussalam sharpens this picture by identifying the two competency domains that any credible framework must reconcile. Assessing the qualification structure for halal food supervisors, a 2025 study in the Journal of Halal Science and Technology found that effective evaluation must weigh Shariah-based judgment alongside technical ex*****on, since supervisors are thoroughly assessed on their ability to adhere to halal standards, while technical competencies include implementing halalan thayyiban practices such as food safety and hygiene. This dual track model religious literacy paired with food science proficiency is precisely what distinguishes halal competency frameworks from conventional HR competency matrices. A Halal Executive who understands but cannot interpret compliance boundaries is only half qualified, and the inverse is equally true. Frameworks that fail to weight both dimensions explicitly risk producing certified staff who satisfy the letter of the appointment requirement without the operational judgment the role actually demands.

5. The supply chain literature extends this two-dimensional logic further upstream, into procurement, logistics and cross border movement of halal goods. A 2023 framework for halal supply chain human capability development proposed organizing workforce competencies around assurance systems on one side and technical operational ex*****on on the other, treating contamination risk as something that a validated system must proactively anticipate rather than react to. That framing matters for Malaysian food pursuing export readiness a workforce trained only to satisfy domestic certification audits is poorly equipped for the traceability and documentation expectations of buyers in the , the , or increasingly and , where digital verification through channels like JAKIM's portal has become the default. Competency, in other words, cannot be static; it must scale with the complexity of the market the business is trying to enter.

6. Strategic research published in 2025 pushes the argument one step further, situating halal competency inside firm-level competitive strategy rather than treating it as a regulatory cost centre. Reviewing HRM practices across halal SMEs, researchers concluded that human resource systems must simultaneously cultivate innovative work behaviour and enforce halal compliance, positioning HR as a direct lever of strategic performance rather than a back-office function. The same review noted a persistent research gap: frameworks that integrate HRM, innovation and regulatory compliance into a single coherent model remain scarce, particularly across different regulatory jurisdictions. For halal SME owner-managers, this has a practical corollary investment in halal-specific human capital should be budgeted alongside, not separately from, investment in product innovation and market expansion, because a workforce fluent in both compliance and adaptability is what ultimately protects certification integrity as the business grows.

7. Digital transformation is now reshaping how these competencies are built and verified. A 2025 literature review in the International Journal of Academic Research in Business and Social Sciences examined how halal organizations are using digital tools across recruitment, training and performance evaluation, concluding that technology enabled human resource development holds real potential for building ethical and competent workforces that meet the demands of the modern business environment. For Malaysian halal SMEs still relying on ad hoc, in-person training cycles, this points toward a near term opportunity: e-learning modules, digital competency tracking, and app-based Shariah-compliance refreshers could substantially lower the cost of maintaining certified staff across multiple premises, a persistent operational burden for smaller exporters juggling MPPHM audits with limited HR headcount.

8. Taken together, the emerging literature suggests that halal competency frameworks for HRM are converging on a shared structure Shariah literacy, technical operational skill, supply chain awareness, and digital adaptability even as implementation across jurisdictions remains fragmented. For Malaysian halal food SMEs preparing for export markets, the practical takeaway is that halal certification and human capital development are no longer separable workstreams. A certified facility with an undertrained workforce is a fragile asset; a well-designed competency framework, embedded into recruitment, training and appraisal systems from the outset, is what converts a halal certificate from a static compliance document into a durable competitive advantage.

References:

Hamdan, F., & Hashim, N. (2025). Assessing the effectiveness of Brunei Darussalam’s halal supervisor qualification: Bridging shariah compliance and technical competency. Journal of Halal Science and Technology, 4(1), 35–50. DOI: https://doi.org/10.59202/jhst.v4i1.966

Kudus, N., Ismail, I. A. Bin, Hassan, M. A., Mohamed, S., & Abdullah, F. (2025). Digital transformation and halal human resource development: Leveraging technology for ethical workforce enhancement: A literature review. International Journal of Academic Research in Business and Social Sciences, 15(2), 1394-1404. DOI: https://dx.doi.org/10.6007/IJARBSS/v15-i2/24641

Nik Mohd Rosli, N. R, Huda, F. H., Ahmad Fadzillah, & Yzh-Y Hashim, Ahmad, A. N. (2022). A conceptual core competency model for halal executives in food manufacturing companies. Journal of Halal Science and Technology, 1(1), 1-14. DOI: https://doi.org/10.59202/jhst.v1i1.450

Puspita Dewi, H. S. C., Rofiaty, Wijayanti, R., & Margono. (2025). Resource-based and strategic HRM perspectives on halal SMEs: A systematic review of innovation, regulation, and performance. Lex localis - Journal of Local Self-Government. 23(6). 5271-5293. DOI: https://doi.org/10.52152/ecercw60

Voak, A., Fairman, B., & Wahyuni, H. C. (2023). Halal supply chain competencies: A framework for human capability development. Journal of Resilient Economies, 3(2), 2653-1917. DOI: https://doi.org/10.25120/jre.3.2.2023.4021

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