Page | 1 MIHAS: The Halal Global Market Place – World Halal Summit KLCC 30 March – 4 April 2015 Halal: Defining Terms, Educating Communities Muhammed Haron (University of Botswana) Abstract Whilst Muslim majority communities have taken the process of observing a Halal system for granted, Muslim minority communities have encountered difficulties in devising and implementing the system because of anti-Halal groups and organizations in countries where they reside as expatriates or as citizens. Nonetheless, though the term Halal is an acceptable concept, non-Muslim communities have generally responded negatively to its employment in their environments; in fact they viewed it as a negative rather than a positive system. The questions that arise are: do we, as Muslim minorities, blame them for reacting negatively? What should we do in order to rectify the misperceptions/misconceptions that they have of Muslims and more specifically the incorrect understanding of the terms‟ usage as well as everything that is associated with it? How should we go about disseminating the term so that it does not carry any negative or incorrect connotations? Well in this presentation one way of doing so is to re-define the term within and beyond a non-Muslim context; in other words, an attempt will be made to provide a holistic definition rather than a myopic insight into the term. Defining the term in a fairly broad manner will indeed assist in providing an opportunity of educating non-Muslims and Muslims alike about the term‟s employment and application. Educating these communities will be critical in that it should help in dispelling the negative notions associated with it. After a method has been devised to concretely and successfully publicize information about the term, efforts should be made by representative groups within the Muslim community of branding the ideas connected to the concept; put differently, the term should be advertised and conveyed in such a manner that non- Muslims should also want to be identified with it; they should be convinced of its wholesome and healthy nature and impact.