The Variations in Religious and Legal Understandings on Halal Slaughter

Purpose: This paper attempts to provide an overview of different understandings regarding the concept of "what constitutes halal" and "who determines this concept?" In practice, this equates to contemporary legal understandings versus religious understandings. The paper further aims to provide an overview of competing Muslim understandings regarding the concept of "What does or does not constitute halal slaughter?" In practice, this equates to evaluating the application of no stunning at all upon an animal (unanimous acceptance) versus the application of reversible stunning upon an animal (contested). Design: The study includes a review of priori literature and considers the current scenario of the halal poultry trade and raises important questions regarding Islamic dietary practices, halal food integrity, religious and animal welfare understandings. Three key questions were raised: "To what extent does stunning impact halal slaughter?’, ‘Who determines what is halal slaughter?’ and ‘What are the variations and tensions between legal and religious understandings of halal slaughter?’ Findings: The examination of such requirements and concomitant consumer and provider expectations is underpinned by a study of an operational framework, i.e. industry practices with poultry (hand slaughter, stunning, mechanical slaughter, etc.), ethical values and market forces to appraise whether there is a point of convergence for these that can be beneficial for both seller and consumer concerns. This paper has considered different perspectives on the religious slaughter and provided an overview of competing understandings regarding the above concepts. Originality/value – This study although academic and philosophical in nature, raises questions on route to suggesting future research directions. It provides real value in stimulating more research in the area of halal food production and contributes to the understanding of different slaughter requirements for religious slaughter and the meat industry. It further sheds light on not only the religious and secular legal frameworks on animal slaughter and welfare but also the variations in understanding between them and provides examples of attempts to bridge any gap. The paper highlights the importance of halal food based on religious values and its implications for wider society

Physicochemical and rheological characterization of honey from Mozambique

[EN] Obtaining information about honey from Mozambique is the first step towards the economic and nutritional exploitation of this natural resource. The aim of this study was to evaluate physicochemical (moisture, hydroxymethylfurfural ¿HMF¿, electrical conductivity, Pfund colour, CIE L*a*b* colour and sugars) and rheological parameters elastic modulus G0 , loss modulus G00 and complex viscosity h*) obtained at different temperatures (from 10 to 40 C). All the physicochemical parameters were in agreement with the international regulations. Most of the honey samples were classed as honeydew honey since they were dark and had conductivity values above 0.800 mS/cm. The moduli G0, G00 and h* decreased with increasing temperature. G 0 and G00 were strongly influenced by the applied frequency, whereas h* did not depend on this parameter, demonstrating Newtonian behaviour. An artificial neural network (ANN) was applied to predict the rheological parameters as a function of temperature, frequency and chemical composition. A multilayer perceptron (MLP) was found to be the best model for G00 and h*(r2 > 0.950), while probabilistic neural network (PNN) was the best for G0(r2 ¿ 0.758). Sensitivity testing showed that in the case of G00 and G0 frequency and moisture were the most important factors whereas for h* they were moisture and temperature.The authors thank the Ministerio de Ciencia e Tecnologia Ensino Superior e Tecnico Profissional de Mocambique (Project: HEST "Ensino Superior, Ciencia e Tecnologia") and Universidade Pedagogica de Mocambique-Nampula for the grant awarded to Fernando Tanleque Alberto.Escriche Roberto, MI.; Alberto, FJT.; Visquert Fas, M.; Oroian, M. (2017). Physicochemical and rheological characterization of honey from Mozambique. LWT - Food Science and Technology. 86:108-115. doi:10.1016/j.lwt.2017.07.053S1081158