Ajinomoto Indonesia Haram or Halal?

Abstract

On 5 January 2001 the Japanese Asahi Shinbun newspaper reported that the Indonesian Department of Health had ordered P.T. Ajinomoto-Indonesia to withdraw its product, Ajinomoto, an artificial seasoning of monosodium glutamate (MSG), from the market because it contained pork. A few days later, the then Indonesian president Abdurrahman Wahid, also an expert on fiqh, expressed to the Japanese Minister of Justice that he believed the Ajinomoto seasoning could indeed be consumed by Muslims. This seemingly trivial occurrence nonetheless became intertwined in the religious and political issues of Indonesia under the Wahid government.