Brunei Halal Brand To Be Showcased At ASEAN Food Meet

by Debbie Too

Bandar Seri Begawan – The Brunei Halal brand will have its first
regional showcase at the ASEAN Food Conference here next week as the
government continues its drive to globalise the brand.

“The Brunei Halal brand will definitely be presented. It is an
opportunity for us to present our brand now,” Dato Paduka Hj Mohd Hamid
Hj Mohd Jaa far, permanent secretary of the Ministry of Industry and
Primary Resources, said yesterday.

“The participants will be made up of basically scientists and it is a biannual event related to food,” he said.

About 500 participants from ASEAN countries will be attending the October 21-23 summit.

The Brunei Halal brand is on target with its brand development
schedule including the review of about 50 products for release by April
next year, said Noel Shield, interim chief executive officer of Ghanim
International Food Corporation Sdn Bhd.

Ghanim International is the Brunei Company that handles and manages
the marketing of the Sultanate’s premium halal brand which takes
advantage of the country’s reputation in selling goods to a growing
Muslim market. The company is looking at major retailers such as Tesco
and Carrefour to help sell products registered under the Brunei Halal
brand to its target markets, Shield said in a previous interview.

During the recent International Halal Food Conference, marketing experts said

Brunei is the first in the Muslim world to put together a
national halal brand that is intended to push the commercial aspects of
consumption that complies with the teachings of syariah.

“The local food industry has a lot of challenges, and that is why
the AFC (ASEAN Food Conference) will be an opportunity to network with
other experts. We will have a few hundred participants, so they will
present their new findings so we can learn from them and sit down and
talk about the challenges that we are facing,” said Pg Hjh Rosidah Pg
Hj Metussin, assistant director of agriculture, from the Agriculture
Department.

The three-day conference will see food experts from the
international and ASEAN community gather at the Rizqun International
Hotel to discuss topics under the theme “Food Science and Technology:
Innovative Approaches and Opportunities for Global Market”.

“Local participants could learn a lot and there will be about 400
papers that will come out from the three-day conference,” she said.

Some of the topics that will be discussed include post harvesting,
nutrition and health, food standards and regulations, alternative
ingredients, food service and entrepreneurship, food chemistry,
microbiology and analysis, sensory evaluation, food processing and
product development, food engineering and mechanisation, halal foods,
food safety and policies, functional food and food biotechnology, risk
assessment strategies, sanitation and decontamination issues in food
industry and food marketing and distribution.

The ASEAN Food Conference has, since its inception, developed into
an important regional forum for food scientists, technologists,
engineers and industry managers and executives as well as government
personnel and students in the field of food science and technology,”
said a statement from the organisers.

The conference is organised by the ASEAN Committee on Science and
Technology and the Federation of Institutes of Food Science and
Technology, supported by the Ministry of Development, Department of
Agriculture, Ministry of Industry and Primary Resources, Brunei
Darussalam Association of Food Science and Technology and Universiti
Brunei Darussalam.– Courtesy of The Brunei Times