Halaal (Arabic: حلال, “permissible”) describes food that meets a defined set of standards covering how animals are raised, handled and processed. It is closest in spirit to a quality and integrity certification — free-range, organic, kosher — with its own requirements rooted in Islamic dietary law.

For most everyday food — fruit, vegetables, grains, dairy, fish and most packaged goods — halaal simply means the product was made without certain prohibited ingredients, chiefly pork and alcohol derivatives, and handled with care for hygiene and food safety.

What Certification Actually Checks

  • Animal welfare. Animals must be healthy and well treated, with access to food and water and without unnecessary stress. A sick, injured or mistreated animal cannot be certified halaal.
  • Hygiene. Strict standards through the whole production chain, with facilities, equipment and handling kept free of cross-contamination. That benefits every consumer, not only Muslims.
  • Traceability. From source through processing, packaging and distribution, documented and audited.
  • Regular audits. Certification is not a one-time tick-box. Certified businesses are inspected, and certification is withdrawn if standards slip.

Much of this overlaps with mainstream food safety. A halaal-certified product has been independently checked not only for religious compliance but for the systems that keep food consistent, traceable and honestly labelled.

Three Things People Usually Ask

Does it taste different? No. Certification affects how food is sourced and processed, not how it tastes. A halaal burger tastes like any other burger.

Is it only for Muslims? Not at all. Many non-Muslims choose halaal products for the hygiene standards, cleaner ingredient lists and transparent sourcing. In South Africa a great many fast food chains and off-the-shelf products are certified, so a large number of South Africans eat halaal food regularly without thinking about it.

Are all certifications the same? No — and this is worth knowing. Bodies differ in standards, in rigour and in how much of their standing they publish. Approaches vary particularly on nuanced matters such as stunning, feed ingredients or facility requirements. When in doubt, ask the certifying body directly.

Where the Schools of Thought Differ

The four Sunni schools — Hanafi, Shafi’i, Maliki, Hanbali — agree on the great majority of dietary requirements. Differences remain on points such as whether certain seafood is permissible, whether stunning before slaughter is allowed, the requirements for the person performing the slaughter, the minimum form of the invocation, and the standards for processed ingredients like emulsifiers, gelatin and flavourings.

That is why certifying bodies may certify different products, and why a product accepted by one body may not be accepted by every consumer.

Certification in South Africa

South Africa has one of the most established halaal certification industries in the southern hemisphere, built on a Muslim community of roughly 1.5 million people with roots at the Cape going back to the seventeenth century. The three main certifying bodies are SANHA (the South African National Halaal Authority), NIHT (the National Independent Halaal Trust) and the MJC Halaal Trust. The halaal directory HeyHalaal lists more than 5 800 businesses certified by the three of them, across all nine provinces.

The clearest single piece of evidence that South African certification travels is a foreign government’s own list. All three bodies appear on the gazetted list of Recognised Foreign Halal Certification Bodies maintained by JAKIM, Malaysia’s Department of Islamic Development, in the edition effective 21 August 2026 — one of 96 bodies from 49 countries. Recognition there is at organisation level; for meat and poultry, individual establishments must separately be approved by JAKIM with Malaysia’s Department of Veterinary Services.

Accreditation, Conformity and Recognition Are Three Different Things

These words get used interchangeably, and they should not be. Accreditation means an independent accreditation body has checked the certifier itself and says it is competent. Conformity means a certifier says it works in accordance with a standard — a claim about itself, not a check by anyone else. Recognition means a foreign authority accepts the certifier’s certificates for its own market. Only the first and third involve a second party.

What each body publishes, as at October 2026:

  • SANHA states that it has been accredited by the GCC Accreditation Centre since 2017 and by the Emirates International Accreditation Centre since 2019, and recognised by JAKIM and by Saudi Arabia’s SASO. It describes its global scheme as assessing compliance against GSO 993, GSO 2055-1, MS 1500 and OIC/SMIIC-1. It is listed by the World Halal Council as a full member, since 2007.
  • NIHT publishes the longest list of foreign standing of the three, with a certificate linked for each: Indonesia’s BPJPH, the Emirates International Accreditation Centre, JAKIM, the UAE Ministry of Industry and Advanced Technology, Singapore’s MUIS, Saudi Arabia’s SASO, the Central Islamic Council of Thailand, the Muslim Professional Japan Association, and the GCC Accreditation Centre in both Saudi Arabia and Bahrain. It says it complies with and implements SNI 99004:2021, GSO 2055-2:2021, S993:2022, GSO 993 and MS 1500:2019, and lists ISO/IEC 17065:2012, ISO 17021-1:2015 and ISO 9001:2015 among its certification schemes. It is a member of the World Halaal Food Council. NIHT’s website is at halaal.org.za.
  • The MJC Halaal Trust states that it has been accredited by SANAS, the South African National Accreditation System, to ISO/IEC 17065:2012 — the international standard for bodies that certify products. It also describes working relationships with more than forty foreign certifiers.

One correction to a claim that circulates widely, and that an earlier version of this page repeated: it is often said that all three bodies are members of the World Halal Council, and that this is what makes their certificates internationally accepted. Neither half holds. On the Council’s own membership list SANHA is a full member and the other two are not — NIHT’s membership is of the separately named World Halaal Food Council, which is probably where the confusion starts. And the Council describes itself as a federation of certifiers committed to a common standard; it makes no mutual-recognition or market-access guarantee. Acceptance in an importing country is granted by that country’s own authority — JAKIM, SASO, EIAC, MUIS, BPJPH and so on — not by membership of any council.

None of this makes one body better than another, and all three carry recognitions that open real markets. It means that if a certificate matters to you, the thing to ask for is the accrediting or recognising body and the certificate number, which can be checked, rather than a logo.

More on Halaal

This page draws on material published by HeyHalaal, a South African halaal directory and guide site with which SAMNET has a working relationship. Claims about certifying bodies above were checked against those bodies’ own websites, the World Halal Council’s membership list and JAKIM’s gazetted list in October 2026. General information only; for a ruling on a specific product, contact the relevant certification body or a qualified scholar.