Muslim Friendly Tourism (MFT):
Understanding the Supply and Demand Sides
In the OIC Member Countries
17
Chapter 1 - Muslim Friendly Tourism (MFT) Overview
1.1 What is Muslim Friendly Tourism?
With the growth of the Muslim travel market, different terminology and definitions are used to
refer to either the total Muslim travel market or its sub-segments. To better define the
terminology, the study found that both a segmentation of the market as well as a conceptual
framework for MFT is required. This is illustrated by the varying focuses of the terms used by
academics, private & public organizations, and media.
1.1.1 Academic concept of Muslim Friendly Tourism (MFT)
Many academics begin to define MFT by first exploring the elements that comprise tourism
and its impact. Below is a grouping on the understanding of MFT by various academic
professionals. Their discussion on MFT is based on the impact it has on society.
Islamic Motivation
According to Duman (2011) Islamic tourism can be defined as “the activities of Muslims
traveling to and staying in places outside their usual environment for not more than one
consecutive year for participation of those activities that originate from Islamic
motivations which are not related to the exercise of an activity remunerated from within
the place visited”.
Faith-based needs and services
As a niche market “halal friendly” tourism includes; halal hotels, halal transport (halal
airlines), halal food restaurants, halal tour packages and halal finance. Therefore, halal
tourism consists of different sectors which are related with each other. (Akyol and Kilinc -
2014).
Sureerat (2015) defines Halal tourism as offering tour packages and destinations that
are particularly designed to cater for Muslim considerations and address Muslim needs.
Islamic teachings
Fatin Norain Osman (2015) defines Muslim tourism to be based on Islamic teaching that
encourages individuals, especially women and children to travel with their muhrim which
means that someone who has blood relation with them to provide them with security.
1.1.2 Media understanding of MFT
Acknowledgement of MFT by leading media, such as Wall Street Journal’s (2014) reference to
Muslim tourism, is based on the term “Halal Travel”. They tend to indicate that if Halal food is
available then a destination is Muslim friendly. These publications’ views are formed on
discussions with selected organizations in the travel and hospitality industry. In addition,
there is no uniformity of the terminology used across the publications.
Reuters (2014) in their article “Thailand launches Muslim-friendly tourist app” defines
MFT as providing hotels and shopping centers with prayer rooms and halal restaurants.