Food Safety Regulation and Halal Food Issues in Indonesia

Abstract

As the fourth largest populated country and the most populous muslim country in the world, Government of Indonesia pays high attention to ful ll the people’s demand on not only safe but also halal food. Halal is an integrated part in food safety according to Law No 18/2012 concerning Food. Some technical regulations and guidelines, including those spesi c for animal origin food product, are established to guarantee safe and halal food production, distribution, retail, and consumption in the country. In particular, National Development Agenda mentions halal and food safety as food attributes that may improve national food products’ added value thus strengthen SMEs and cooperatives competitiveness as well as food sovereignty. Implementation of regulation and guidelines on food safety and halal food assurance in Indonesia involves government, producer, and consumer. The presentation will share some practical experiences in handling halal food scandal in Indonesia in the past years to extract lesson learned so that constructive and corrective action can be made to strengthen the halal food assurance system in particular and food control system in general.