12
@Halal | november-december. 2019
Cover Story
OFFICIALLY NON-HALAL: The milk-based
candy has been a popular and nostalgic candy
among Malaysians for decades, despite never
being a halal-certified product.
Muslim's
forbidden candy
Many Malaysians were shocked to learn
the news of how the white rabbit candy
was never halal, as it was found to contain
pork-based ingredient
T
he nation (among the millenials
generally) was in a state of shock
a couple of months ago when it
was found that the White Rabbit
Cream Candy was actually not
halal. Many Muslims in Malaysia
claimed to have grew up eating the milk-
based sweets, and how it has shattered their
childhood once they know that it contained
porcine gelatin (read: pork).
The discovery
As most Malaysians would have remembered,
an official statement was made regarding the
non-halal status of the candy by the Deputy
Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department
(Religion), YB Fuziah Salleh back in Septem-
ber this year.
The discovery of its non-halal status how-
ever, was made earlier by Global Haltech’s very
own Halvec Laboratories.
The JAKIM panel lab was doing a routine
method verification process, and they have
selected off-the-shelves food products ran-
domly for testing. It was at that time they
found that the famous (now infamous) white
rabbit candy did in fact, tested positive for
porcine gelatin.
The lab analysts were surprised, and have
made further clarification by doing three
separate tests (PCR, ELISA, and LCMS). They
were made certain by the tests that the result
was not a false-positive.
As a panel lab whose role is to only provide
lab testing for product manufacturers to
obtain halal certification from JAKIM, Halvec
didn’t have the authority to make a statement
regarding their finding. They had however,
notified their results to JAKIM.
The discovery was made more impactful
given the timing, as it occurred during a
resurgence of the candy’s popularity when
it was made into ice cream in the US, and
are then sold by various ice cream parlours
around Singapore, Malaysia, and Brunei as
well.
The spread
The spread of the news about how the candy
contains porcine gelatin came about after a
social media post about the finding was made
public – and it went viral enough to catch the
attention of the Brunei government.
Just as the white rabbit candy was popular
in Malaysia, many Muslims in Brunei also had
the same affinity towards the milky treat.
The Brunei government swiftly ordered
the candy to be tested by the Ministry of
Health’s Department of Scientific Services.
They also contacted Halvec to conduct an
inter-laboratory comparison regarding the
samples tested. Lo and behold, the result were
the same.
In May 2019, the Brunei’s Ministry of
Religious Affairs announced to the public
about the candy’s non-halal status. The two
ice-cream parlours in Brunei who had offered
White Rabbit Cream Candy ice-cream quickly
discontinued the particular flavour and took
necessary measures to clean their equipment
and regain their customer’s confidence.
The Brunei government had also ordered a
nationwide reshuffling of the product among
retailers and have the candy moved to the
non-halal section in all shops and markets
selling.
Malaysians caught wind of the news from
Brunei, and our local ice cream parlours had
also discontinued their offering of the ice
cream.
The announcement
The question that was on many Malaysians’
mind was: Why didn’t our Department of
Islamic Development (JAKIM) make an
official announcement regarding the matter?