Halal Grocers in Belfast Brace for Rising Costs Amid Global Trade Shifts

The storefront of Makkah Market in Belfast. (Credit: Lauren Hartley)

BELFAST — When Brexit first went into effect in 2020, Makkah Market’s Ramadan order came late. The owner, Mohammed Abdelnoor, has since learned that he has to order products for Ramadan at least three weeks in advance to make sure that they arrive on time. Much of his inventory, which previously came through Dublin, now must be routed through London, with some items originally sourced from the Middle East.

While halal food has always required careful sourcing, Brexit added new complications and higher costs.

“Now, when you get stuff from England, they have to declare it in customs,” Abdelnoor said. “It takes two days, then another two or three days—at least a week to get your stuff. Before, we used to get it next-day delivery.”

And now, as the United States seeks to add new tariffs on goods from around the world, merchants like Abdelnoor are feeling a new sense of destabilization as they brace for more delays and higher expenses. The longer and more complicated supply chain means that prices are rising — and customers are noticing.

Even though Northern Ireland is officially a part of the United Kingdom, it has an open trade border with the Republic of Ireland, making it subject to European Union tariffs from the U.S. which are set at a higher rate than those for the UK. This could make prices even higher in Northern Ireland. Paul Krugman, a Nobel Prize winning economist, predicts that firms in the EU will try to export goods through Northern Ireland to benefit from the lower tariff rate.

Inside Makkah Market, a halal grocery store serving Belfast’s Muslim community. (Credit: Lauren Hartley)

Halal food, which Muslims are required to eat according to their faith, cannot contain or be contaminated with any forbidden ingredients, such as alcohol or pork. Animals used for their meat must be killed in a specific way and only by a Muslim. The greatest demand for halal foods usually comes around the time of Ramadan, the holy month in Islam, which ended in late March.

Makkah Market is two miles south from another Belfast halal grocery, Zm Zm Market. Omer Ahmed, a co-owner, said he sees between a 10 and 30% increase in sales during Ramadan. Ahmed starts the ordering process for Ramadan about three to four weeks in advance. He plans for delivery to take about four to five days and factors in extra time to make sure the inventory will be there in time for the holy month.

“One of the biggest challenges we face is that, because the supply chain is so long — with things coming from the Middle East, India, all over the world — the price is usually slightly higher by the time it gets here,” Ahmed said. That’s a challenge because we’re selling halal lamb shoulder for about £12, while you can get the same cut, not halal, from a nearby shop for about £7 to £10 less.”

He understands that it’s a tough sell for some families, even loyal customers. Like many halal stores in Belfast, Zm Zm Market is family owned — and even without the added trade costs, small businesses struggle to compete with the lower prices offered by supermarket chains.

“We have good support from our local customers, but we can’t deny that it [high prices] is even challenging for them,” he said.

“Some customers don’t mind paying one pound extra on a five-kilogram purchase—they’ll get everything here. But others might not. They’ll come here for the halal meat, then go to another shop to get the rest of their items.”

Zein Ibrahim, 25, is one of them. A practicing Muslim, he sticks to halal for meat and a few other essentials but buys most of his groceries at mainstream stores, like Tesco.

“Throughout the year, the only things really that I would get from the halal shop is cheese, the certain type of cheese and the meat,” he said. “Everything else I’m getting from the local supermarket.”

While most halal food in Northern Ireland is not imported from the U.S., tariffs will have a more direct impact on halal markets within the U.S., according several market owners in the U.S. Essa Masoud, general manager of Balady Market, a halal grocery store in Brooklyn, is already preparing for the potential effects. Although he recognizes that tariffs don’t uniquely impact halal businesses, he’s ordering food in advance to help the market prepare.

“The majority of citizens don’t understand what these tariffs really mean,” Masoud says. “Many individuals think that these tariffs are a punishment for China. They’re celebrating the increase of taxes or increase of tariffs on China, and they’re celebrating without understanding that the actual effect is not to China. It’s actually affecting themselves, it’s affecting us.”

Balady Market, in Bay Ridge, is planning to absorb the additional costs through its profit margins to avoid passing them on to customers. However, for countries where tariffs exceed 100%, like China, Masoud says it will be very difficult for the store to absorb those costs entirely.

Kashif Akram, 43, is one of six members on the executive committee at the Belfast Islamic Center. The Islamic Center feeds 300 to 400 people every Friday, Saturday and Sunday during Ramadan, using a mix of donated and sponsored food.

“Everyone’s sitting together, eating and sharing their day — how it went, their food — and just mingling, and I thought it was wonderful,” Akram said. “And as the month went on, I’ve seen a big change in attitudes from the beginning, where the first day it was all pushing and ‘I want more,’ to people being very humbled throughout the period and getting to know each other, being more respectful, actually being more giving — ‘Here, do you want more?”

Correction: This story has been updated to correct the spelling of Essa Masoud’s surname.