Zakat Assessment for Agricultural in Malaysia: Rules, Fatawa, and Practices

This paper aims to analyze the assessment of agricultural zakat among farmers in Malaysia based on manuals, fatawa and practices of various zakat institutions in Malaysia. According to the rules the assessment of agricultural zakat is made after deducting the production costs or farming cost. However, the fatawa issued by most of the states in Malaysia does not allow the farming costs such as fertilizers, plowing seeds, harvesting and transportation to be deducted, let alone, the living costs of the farmers. Nevertheless, the zakat assessment for income shows otherwise, where one’s living costs are allowed to be deducted from one’s gross income. Based on content analysis on secondary data as well as primary data, the discussions in this paper are divided into three sections. Firstly, this paper reviews in brief the classical works on production costs and living costs as the background of this research. Secondly, this paper examines the present zakat assessment method for agriculture as practiced by the zakat institutions in Malaysia. Thirdly, this paper intends to analyze the agricultural zakat assessments that ought to be practiced, by taking into account the classical works and types of agricultural zakat of today. It is therefore important to note that, by taking into consideration the type of agriculture nowadays, there is a strong and urgent need for a re-evaluation of the agricultural zakat assessment. In addition, the meaning of zakat itself is taking the assets from the rich to be distributed to the poor and not otherwise. DOI: 10.5901/jesr.2014.v4n2p11