Dutch Firm Sees Potential In Malaysia As World's Halal Hub

An established Dutch logistics company, which handles shipments of food products, feels that Malaysia has "great potential" to become the world's halal hub if Malaysian suppliers of halal food products did their homework well and build up an effective network abroad. VAT Logistics, which is based in the port city of Rotterdam and with branches in several countries, said it has been watching closely the progress made by Malaysia's processed food industry. "We have also participated twice in the International Halal Food Fair held in Kuala Lumpur and received business enquiries from halal food suppliers in Malaysia, Indonesia and elsewhere about cold storage facilities for halal food," said Ruud Vat, the company's owner, in an interview at the just-concluded five-day Transport Logistics 2007 Fair held in Munich. Vat, whose company is a customs broker with its own warehousing facilities, urged Malaysian exporters to tap the halal food markets of Europe which has a total Muslim population of about 30 million. "At present, halal food products are sold in small butcher's shops. However, we believe this is going to change once bigger and well-established players step in, a development which is expected to take place soon," he said. "We are, consequently, preparing ourselves for such a change and I believe Malaysia can emerge a key player with its experience in the supply of halal food products and its well-developed infrastructure for halal food production," said Vat, whose staff members regularly visit Asia, including Malaysia. With an eye on securing potential business from halal food suppliers in Malaysia and elsewhere, Vat said his company already has halal certification for one of its cold storage facilities. He said his company could handle food shipments from Malaysia, according to halal regulations. "We have so far been handling shipments of automotive parts from Malaysia, which are stored in our warehouses and subsequently distributed to France, Germany, the Netherlands and other parts of Europe," he added. Along with halal food products, Malaysia's strength also lies in the automotive parts sector. A section of exhibitors at the Transport Logistics 2007 Fair comprised companies that specialise in automotive logistics. These exhibitors said they were looking at both Malaysia and Thailand, which is already profiling itself as the "Detroit of South-East Asia", thanks to the growing automotive parts trade. Wolfgang Reuther, who runs an automotive logistics company near Frankfurt, said that while Thailand had built up an extensive distribution and logistics network for cars, Malaysia was strong in the manufacture of automotive parts and components. According to him, the quality of Malaysian-made automotive parts is better than many other Asian suppliers, particularly those from China and Vietnam, both of whom are aggressively entering Europe's markets with low-priced products.