It is unacceptable and even irresponsible that the Department of Veterinary Sciences (DVS) Director General Datuk Mohamad Azmie Zakaria could say that he cannot guarantee adequate supply of turkeys this Christmas.
It was reported in today’s Sin chew Daily that he has said so as not only there is the problem of importing halal turkeys from Australia, there are also technical problems with the import of some turkeys from Brazil and America.
Such explanations are not only UN satisfactory and unacceptable but rather bizarre and mind boggling.
In The Star report 4 days ago, Malaysian Association of Food Animal Veterinarian past President Datuk Dr Vincent Ng said Goldfields Turkeys was the sole exporter of the halal meat to Malaysia. But the company had closed.
I have checked and found that an Australian paper had reported on July 12, 2013 that Goldfields would be closed before last Christmas.
There was definitely more than sufficient time for VOS to find and approve new suppliers to Malaysia. So why are we facing a shortage today?
In the same report, Mohamd Azmie was reported to say that efforts had been made to bring halal turkey into Malaysia.
He said a processing plant in New Zealand, which has halal certification, had been chosen although its products had yet to be inspected by the authorities here.
“We can allow it (the turkey) to come in. The plant uses Jakim standards as a guideline,” he said.
He said a plant in Brazil, also with halal certification, was approved by the DVS in June but importers here ran into problems.
General explanations will not suffice and Mohamad Azmie must explain what are the actual problems faced by the importers and why VOS could not help resolve the problems for so long?
There are also two questions that Mohamad Azmie must answer.
Firstly, why must turkeys imported be halal when there are limited suppliers of halal turkeys?
Secondly, since there are problems of import of halal turkeys , why did not DVS at least allow special import of non halal turnkeys for Christmas season since Christians will have no issue with consuming non halal turkeys?
Be considerate Mohamad Azmie.