DEARBORN, Mich. – Lunch business is booming in the Dearborn School District, thanks to the focus on serving foods prepared in accordance with the Muslim faith.

While many school districts across the country struggle to comply with federal school food regulations championed by first lady Michelle Obama, Dearborn schools are switching more schools over to halal foods, an effort that was launched in 2001 and grown rapidly since, the Arab American News reports.

Dearborn food service coordinator Jeff Murphy said 22 of the district’s 32 schools serve halal alternatives – meat and poultry options with increased growth in recent years driven by requests from principals and parent teacher groups.

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The movement is driving increased participation in the National School Lunch Program, and the district is using the increased revenues to off-set the more expensive halal offerings, he said.

Student lunch participation is “probably 4 to 6 percent higher, which, in a district our size is considerable,” Murphy said.

“The district of more than 19,000 students serves approximately 11,000 meals per day. In 2001, that number was about 7,500. At Lowrey School, the average meals served increased after the introduction of halal options from 587 in 2001 to 898 last school year,” Arab American News reports.

The growth stands in stark contrast to many schools across the country that have experienced a precipitous drop in lunch participation since a ratcheting set of federal restrictions on calories, fat, sugar, sodium, whole grain, fruits and vegetables were first imposed on schools in 2012. Hundreds of entire schools have opted to forego federal subsidies to drop out of the National School Lunch Program and ditch the overbearing requirements after lunch revenues cratered.

Since the changes, more than 1.2 million students stopped eating school lunches, and school food waste skyrocketed by $1 billion a year.

But school officials in New York City and San Diego are calling Murphy for advice on offering halal options in their cafeterias.

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The halal options are more expensive, and the district offers halal options only for some foods to avoid confusion, but booming lunch sales show the district’s majority Muslim population is getting the foods it wants, Murphy said.

“My job is to feed as many kids as I can and that’s what I do,” he told the news site.

Halal is similar to kosher as a religious edict about what followers can and cannot eat, drink or use on their bodies. Pork is the only completely non-halal meat, but other meats must meet certain criteria to be considered halal.

“Specifically, the slaughter must be performed by a Muslim, who must precede the slaughter by invoking the name of Allah, most commonly by saying ‘Bismillah’ (‘In the name of God’) and then three times ‘Allahu akbar’ (God is the greatest),” according to Wikipedia.org. “Then, the animal must be slaughtered with a sharp knife by cutting the throat, windpipe and the blood vessels in the neck, causing the animal’s death without cutting the spinal cord. Lastly, the blood from the veins must be drained.”

Murphy told the Arab American News halal meat is tastier than non-halal.

The news site cites a study showing a growing global halal market, predicted to reach $1.6 trillion by 2018.

At least six countries have banned the religious slaughter of animals over concerns animals are not stunned prior to killing, as is the case with mainstream slaughter methods