World noodle producers agree to 'halal' status

World noodle producers agree to 'halal' status

By Riyadi

NUSA DUA, Bali (JP): The world's major noodle producers ended
their two-day summit here on Friday, endorsing PT Indofood Sukses
Makmur's proposal to include Islamic halal dietary laws in the
new international standards for noodles.

The producers grouped in the International Ramen Manufacturers
Association (IRMA) agreed to submit the proposal to the Rome-
based Codex Alimentarius, a U.N. body that sets global food
product standards, by the end of this year

"The summit agreed with the proposal of PT Indofood Sukses
Makmur Tbk to have the element halal included in the Codex draft
in order to comply with the requirements of countries with an
Islamic majority, and Islamic countries in particular," they said
in a joint statement called the Bali Declaration.

The newly-installed director general of IRMA, Eva Riyanti
Hutapea, who is also president of Indofood, said if Codex
accepted the proposal, international noodle producers wanting to
sell their noodles in Indonesia or in other Islamic countries
would have to have a halal label on their products.

Halal certification would allow inspectors from groups such as
the Indonesian Ulemas Association to make random tests of the
products to ensure they conform to Islamic regulations.

The acceptance of the halal term in the draft international
standards for noodles should give Muslims peace of mind in making
food choices.

Eva said she would soon form a task force to draft the
Indonesian version of international standards for noodles which
would include a halal clause. The task force would be headed by
F.G. Winarno, former president of Codex.

Winarno, a lecturer at the Bogor Institute of Agriculture,
said the halal clause in the new international standards for
noodles had to conform with Codex's global guidelines on the use
of the term halal in any food products issued in December, 1998.

"The basic idea of Codex's guidelines on the use of the term
halal is that they must be on a voluntarily basis, and never be
mandatory," he said.

Besides the halal clause, Winarno said the new international
standards for noodles would set standards for raw materials, food
additives (i.e. alkalis, antioxidants, colors, preservatives),
hygiene standards, packaging and labeling.

He said such recognized international standards were necessary
to protect consumers so that there would be no more issues such
as "instant noodles could negatively affect the development of
human brains."

Koki Ando of Food Nissin Products Co Ltd of Japan said such
standards would protect not only consumers but also producers
because only through meeting high standards of safety and health
would their food products be accepted by consumers.

Although currently there were no international standards for
noodles, Ando said, instant noodles all over the world followed
strict standards of food production in their respective
countries, he said.

"Otherwise, they would be abandoned by consumers," he said.

In addition to the standards, IRMA members from nine countries
participating in the summit were also committed to expanding
global instant noodle consumption from 43.4 billion packs or
servings in 1997 to 100 billion by 2010.

Expanding instant noodle production was necessary not only to
boost producers' profitability but also to safeguard food
availability for the common people, said the inventor of instant
noodle, Momofuku Ando.

Therefore, he said, instant noodles have to be cheap and
affordable for the common people.

The producers said in the declaration that instant noodles
should continue to serve as an important alternative in tackling
food shortages or even food crises.

"As a processed food, ramen (noodle) counts among those that
most effectively retain the original calorific value of the wheat
from which it is made, making it a food that will be valuable as
part of any solution to a food crisis," the declaration said.

IRMA on Friday night symbolically donated 2.5 million packs of
instant noodles worth around Rp 1 billion (US$110 million) to the
Indonesian people in need through the Indonesian government.

The noodles would be produced by local noodle firms under a
special brand called Mi Peduli IRMA (IRMA Care Noodle).