Increase in halal eateries may help bring more Muslim visitors to Hong Kong
- As the city courts tourists and investment from the Middle East, the tourism board is considering a new certification system to open doors to more restaurants
Despite being home to one of the most dynamic restaurant scenes in the world, Hong Kong offers Muslim visitors and residents only a small taste of what others enjoy. So it was encouraging to hear that the Hong Kong Tourism Board is considering a new halal certification system to open doors to more restaurants.
The move would better serve the city’s 300,000 Muslim residents. It also could become part of a recipe for economic success by drawing more leisure and business travellers from the Middle East and Southeast Asia.
Tourism board executive director Dane Cheng Ting-yat said this month that authorities were considering a “more suitable” halal certification scheme to put into place next year, to replace the current “extremely strict” system which severely limits the number of qualified restaurants.
The city relies on the Incorporated Trustees of the Islamic Community Fund of Hong Kong to grant halal certificates and ensure compliance through unannounced inspections. It is prohibited, or “haram”, to eat pork or meat from dogs, cats, monkeys and predators. Halal, or “permitted”, chickens, cows and sheep must be slaughtered under Islamic rules.
Food must be prepared separate to prohibited items and utensils washed by Muslim staff or trained personnel.
The Tourism Board says the city has about 105 halal-certified restaurants, far fewer than the 4,000 such eateries in Singapore, which ranked No 11 out of 138 destinations in last year’s Global Muslim Travel Index. Hong Kong was No 30, right behind Taiwan and Thailand.
The index gave Hong Kong a promising No 5 among “non-Islamic destinations”, which should whet the city’s appetite for doing more to satisfy visitors increasingly important to its future.
In 2022, the city’s largest Middle East trading partner was the United Arab Emirates, followed by Israel, Saudi Arabia and Qatar. City leader John Lee Ka-chiu made a high-profile trip to Saudi Arabia in 2023, and business-level visits and the city’s first exchange-traded fund tracking Saudi shares have come since.
Hong Kong also wants to attract travellers from Southeast Asia, including Malaysia and Indonesia – the world’s most populous Muslim nation.
Officials are focusing this year on developing tourism from the Middle East, with basic Muslim needs and how to secure halal accreditations. In January, the city hosted its largest trade and consumer fair highlighting halal products and business practices.
Adapting menus may prove a tall order for some restaurants, especially those specialising in Cantonese dishes featuring pork, but rising to the challenge could create belt and road opportunities. The China-centred trade initiative covers more than 100 countries, where Muslims make up close to half of the population.
