Enablers of halal food purchase among Muslim consumers in an emerging economy: an interpretive structural modeling approach Waseem Khan Institute of Business Management, GLA University, Mathura, India Asif Akhtar Department of Business Administration, Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh, India Saghir Ahmad Ansari Department of Agricultural Economics and Business Management, Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh, India, and Aruna Dhamija Institute of Business Management, GLA University, Mathura, India Abstract Purpose – This study aims at identifying a set of determinants that affect halal food purchase intention and measures the relative ranks of these determinants in purchasing halal food among Muslim consumers in India. Design/methodology/approach – Interpretive structural modeling (ISM) approach has been employed in the research, which is an expert opinion-based approach. The opinions of experienced academicians and marketing professionals have been recorded for reaching to the conclusions. Matrice d’ impacts croises multiplication appliqu e an classement (MICMAC) analysis has also been applied to examine the driving and dependent power of these determinants. Findings – Driver power–dependence matrix reveals that although knowledge of halal and attitude are weak drivers, yet they are strongly dependent upon other determinants. These two variables are at the top of the ISM digraph hierarchy. Food safety and halal labeling have strong driving power, as well as strong dependence. Three determinants, namely brand origin, religiosity and price, have strong driving powers and weak dependence. These variables lay at the bottom level of the ISM model. Practical implications – This study provides a better understanding of the determinants of halal food purchase intention. This will help the marketers for making appropriate and effective product design and other marketing strategies suited to the needs of the consumer. Originality/value – This is the first study that examines the interrelationships between determinants and relative rank of these determinants in halal food purchase, using ISM approach and MICMAC analysis. Keywords Interpretive structural modeling, MICMAC, Halal food, Purchase intention Paper type Research paper 1. Introduction Religion is one of the main factors that influence people’s choice of food consumption (Just et al., 2007). Anything which is permissible or acceptable in Islam is termed as halal (Eliasi and Dwyer, 2002; Berry and Donna, 2002) and dietary habits according to Islamic principles are known as halal food consumption (Ambali and Bakar, 2014). Any processed food product is halal only when the ingredients used to prepare are halal and allowed in Islamic dietary code (Zurina, 2004). The halal food market is one of the fastest growing markets in the world (Burgmann, 2007). There are about 1.6 bn Islamic followers in the world who are following Islamic-mandated dietary laws and avoiding for bidden foods (Ireland and Rajabzadeh, 2011). Market size of halal food is approximately 16% of the total food industry in the world. According to state of Global Islamic Economy Report Halal food purchase among Muslim consumers 2273 The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at: https://www.emerald.com/insight/0007-070X.htm Received 19 September 2018 Revised 17 August 2019 14 December 2019 28 January 2020 Accepted 27 February 2020 British Food Journal Vol. 122 No. 7, 2020 pp. 2273-2287 © Emerald Publishing Limited 0007-070X DOI 10.1108/BFJ-08-2018-0528