Is Asda really secretly selling Halal meat?

Claims that UK supermarket Asda are furtively selling Halal meat are spreading online after a user uploaded a photo of a pack of minced beef with the code HMA attached to it, which the user claims stands for Halal Monitoring Authority (or Halal Meat Authority.)

The claims go further by claiming that this is an effort by Asda to sell Halal certified products with ambiguous labelling that most consumers would not pick up on. A Variant of the rumour can be seen below –

ATTENTION – You are being unknowingly sold halal meat!
Today my mum has been to ASDA and bought some British beef mince to make my favourite; Lasagne.
Looking at the packaging, very small next to the use by date is written ‘HMA’.
After ringing ASDA and asking them what this symbol means they eventually told me it means ‘HALAL MONITORING AUTHORITY’.
For those of you who don’t know what Halal meat is, it is meat that has been prayed over and the animal slit across the throat and left to bleed to death. To understand the unnecessary torture these animals go through here’s a video but I warn you it is upsetting
link removed.
Look at how small this symbol is on the packaging. How are we supposed to know what HMA stands for and the worst part is every pack of beef mince on the shelf had this symbol on it, so we aren’t even given the option to buy non halal meat.
I am disgusted with ASDA and we will now be trying to source meat from elsewhere, and possibly the rest of our shopping. And NO I will not be eating that lasagne!
Here’s ASDAs customer service email if you’d like to tell them what you think.

However, the rumours are false.

Halal is a word connected to Islam that means “permissible”, the opposite of Haram that means “prohibited”. Halal meat has been produced in such a way that makes it okay for Muslims to consume.

Firstly, the HMA code on the Asda packaging uploaded to social media does not stand for Halal Monitoring Authority. There is no “Halal Monitoring Authority” in the UK (there is in Canada, but Asda do not operate there.) According to a statement released by Asda on the matter –

HMA is a product code, which refers to the different sites of our suppliers. All our Asda branded products contain different combinations of letters that determine where a product is supplied from.

Further enquiries reveal that the HMA code refers to the Doncaster packing plant.

It is worth noting that the largest Halal food authority in the UK is the Halal Food Authority (HFA.) Asda also claimed that while they do produce Halal certified meat, it is clearly identified as such –

Our own label halal meat is very clearly labelled as halal, so our customers can make an informed choice when purchasing their meat.

So bottom line, HMA has nothing whatsoever to do with Halal. Asda are not secretly passing of Halal meat products to their customers.

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Addressing another misconception…

A popular misconception about Halal meat that has become popular as a result of this rumour is that all animals killed to Halal guidelines are not pre-stunned during slaughter and thus the slaughter process is more inhumane to the animal than other traditional slaughter processes.

However in the majority of cases in the UK this is not true. Whilst not stunning animals prior to being killed is legal in the UK due to religious exemptions, most Halal slaughterhouses do – nonetheless – use stunning prior to killing the animals, and most major UK supermarkets – including Asda – only accept meat from slaughterhouses if stunning has taken place.

In fact according to this report from the Halal Food Authority, most supermarkets – again including Asda – insist on CCTV being installed in slaughterhouses that supply their meat to ensure that animals are being killed according to their guidelines.

A number of organisations already require CCTV. The FWAC notes that most major food retailers including Asda, the Co-operative, Iceland, Marks and Spencer, Morrisons, Sainsbury’s, Tesco, Lidl and Waitrose now insist upon the use of CCTV in supply chain slaughterhouses. The RSPCA requires CCTV in abattoirs that are members of its Freedom Food scheme

Additionally, according to this Guardian report, it is estimated that 88% of Halal certified food is stunned prior to slaughter.

Of course it should be noted that this does not apply to all slaughterhouses, as some still forego stunning the animal completely, something which has attracted much controversy from animal welfare campaigners.

There is a real debate over labelling in the UK right now to make it clearer if a product is Halal certified as well as more transparency over letting the customer know if the meat they are buying involving stunning during the slaughtering procedure.

Either way, this is just addressing an additional misconception. The Asda issue is clear – HMA does not mean Halal certified on Asda packaging.