Halal travelling used to be an alien concept less then ten years ago in Malaysia. With the augmentation of Muslim middle-income earners and requests for Halal travel, local companies specializing in Muslim packages inundate the tourism market – each offering the best deal. THE HALAL JOURNAL spoke to Naaimah Abdullah, direct of TM Tours & Travel Sdn Bhd, to find out more on her motivations in providing fuss-free Halal travel.

Tell us about your company.

TM Tours & Travel Sdn Bhd which has been operating for the past 13 years, is a Bumiputera-owned company. We cater mostly to a Malay clientele, which makes about 95 percent of our clients.

Can you tell me why travelling abroad used to be a hassle for Muslims?

Food used to be – and continues to be – the biggest problem for travelling Muslims. Islam puts a huge importance on the food source. A no-pork meal may be perceived as more or less Halal, but the Halal-ness of a food goes beyond that simple definition. Omitting the pork is certainly not good enough for discerning  Muslim travelers because there are other aspects to be taken into consideration; the animal-slaughtering process for instance.

How did you come about to offer your services for Muslim travellers?

We started our Muslim packages with travels to China in 1995 and have more than nine years experience in the domain. We tend to overlook this vast country when in reality China has an important concentration of Muslims. Xin Jiang for instance, has a total Muslim population of 30 million. Five years ago, Malaysian Muslims were still scared that they could not find Halal meals in China. A scare that is totally baseless now as we are also capable of providing good Halal meals.

Can you explain how you solve the Halal food problem in China?

The first thing we did when we arrive there was to teach our Chinese counterparts how to prepare dishes like telur dadar (omelette) and chicken curry to suit our Malaysian traveller’s taste buds. All the products are purchased from a huge Muslim supermarket that resembles our local Giant convenience store. You may find stuff like sambal (chilli condiments) but it is nowhere near our sambal belacan (laughs). I think it is normal if we cannot get local taste abroad. This is something that Malaysians need to realise when they travel. However, a steak will always be a steak- as long as it is Halal, there should no t be any problem with it. Even within Malaysia, you can find versatility in its dishes – be it Malay, Chinese or Indian food. Let us not look that far – Malay cuisines are rather diverse as well, depending on which part of the country you are.

How about costs for Halal meals?

In term of costs, Muslim packages are about 40 percent higher than normal packages. When you go to non-Muslim countries, it is only logical that Muslim dishes are expensive, right?

Would you say that your Muslim packages are all about food?

Our Muslim travel packages are not just restricted on meals. They include several aspects of lifestyle like shopping and charity. Let us take the Chinese Muslim community in China as an example. Their settlements used to be in the middle of the town but after 1979, their lands were taken away in the name of city beautification. Because the government wanted to build parks! Now, there is no one common centre for these Chinese Muslims as they are scattered all over the place. It is basically the break-and-rule policy. In Beijing alone, there are 16 million city-dwellers, out of which 300,000 are Muslims.

We asked ourselves, “How can we help each other?” We then got a Muslim travel agent from China and tried to collaborate in a win-win situation. For example, we include lunch or dinner in a  calligraphy centre as part of our tour programme. Customers may then purchase some calligraphy paintings where a percentage of it will then be channelled to several Muslim communities.

Tell us what you have observed from other countries with Muslim communities.

Muslims in France and Holland are lucky in the sense that their community is aided by the Moroccan and Algerian governments, in addition to Indonesian and Holland. Unfortunately, I cannot say the same thing about the Muslim community in Spain because it is very small and disunited.

Where do your clients come from?

They do not come from one sole source. Apart from walk-in clients, we have been dealing with associations such as PERKIM. When it comes to getting business, we have to be flexible. We tailor make our packages according to our customers’ needs. In September this year for example, we are organising a two-week trip to Spain and Morocco for 40 kadis to visit the countries’ Islamic heritages.

How successful are your Muslim packages?

Very successful indeed. People call in and request for Muslim packages. It is good that we are giving them choices. There are more and more Muslims coming to us now that we provide choices when travelling. We have even received requests from non-Muslims who wanted to travel with Muslim packages – our Indian clientele who do not want to eat pork, for instance.

What is your biggest problem in organising Muslim travels?

Visa. It is very difficult to obtain visas for some specific countries nowadays, especially post 911. To make things even more complicated, we organise trips for big groups (more than 20 people). We have travel agents working for us in the USA but due to some visa problems, we are incapable of including the country in our Muslim travel destinations for now.

How affected are you by the recent SARS outbreak in China?

Our industry is easily affected by government statements. For example, when Malaysians were discouraged to travel to China due to SARS, it affected our business. Even though it was such an isolated case, there was a 50 percent decline in our company’s income. Nevertheless, I am positive that the industry will be prosperous for the next couple of years.

Tell us about your clientele demography.

Most of our clients are from the middle-income level, retired, aged 55 and above. This is the interesting fact: more than 80 percent of our clients are women. They could either be unmarried women or single mothers. And believe it or not, these women tend to stick together, form their own group and travel (laughs)! Men normally travel for business purposes and not leisure. As far as youngsters are concerned, I have observed that they prefer travelling with non-Muslim travel agents and are likely to spend less than RM500 per person for a package. It is very difficult for youngsters to travel as they have job commitments, whereas elderly people have the luxury of time.

How would you describe yourself?

In my line of work, one has to know how to be pro-active. You cannot afford to be passive. When it comes to business, I am a risk-taker. My policy is simple: say ‘yes’ first – never say ‘no’! And never give up!

**This article was first published in The Halal Journal Pilot Issue (August 2004), and was written by Remi Yahya-Ishmael.