Q. Could you please explain what zakah should be paid for the produce of irrigated or unirrigated land. What is the zakah rate for fruits and vegetables?
I would like also to know what zakah is payable for cattle, sheep, goats and cows, and their milk and dairy products. How about fisheries, chicken and their products?
How does a farmer who sells his produce once or twice a year calculate his zakah liability?
Safraz M. Khan
Yanbu
A. There are differences among scholars on which types of agricultural produce are liable to zakah. However, with the type of farming that we have today, it is more appropriate to include all types in one’s liability to zakah. The threshold is defined as five wasqs. A wasq is a measure of volume, and five of it are equal to 1600 Iraqi ratl, which is a weight unit. It can be easily calculated in present day measures and weights.
The rate is 10 percent if the land is irrigated easily, either depending on rain, or other easy means that require no effort or expense. If the land depends on machines or purchased water for irrigation, then the rate of zakah is 5 percent. Some scholars say that no zakah is payable on vegetable and fruit produce, but to apply this to the produce of large farms with tens or hundreds of trees is to exempt large estates from zakah, which does not fit with the fairness of the zakah system.
Zakah on agricultural produce does not work on a yearly basis. God commands that we pay zakah for such produce on harvest day. “Eat of their fruits when they come to fruition, and give (to the poor) what is due to them on harvest day.” (6: 141) This means that a farmer calculates his zakah liability once he has determined the size of his produce. If it exceeds the threshold, he pays out his zakah as soon as possible.
Zakah on animals is payable every year, provided that the stock exceeds the threshold of zakah. Also, such animals should be of the type that grazes naturally. In the case of sheep and goats, the minimum threshold is 40, when one sheep is due. Two sheep become due for 121, and three sheep for 201. Thereafter, one extra sheep is added for each 100.
With cows, the minimum threshold is 30, and the rate is one male or female aged one year. If the cows are 40, then one two-year old female cow is due. For 60 cows, two cows of one year of age. With 70, two cows, one of them one year old and the other two years. For 80 cows, the rate is two female cows of two years each. Then we move up 10 at a time, increasing the liability pro rata.
In camels the threshold is five camels when the rate is one sheep of more than one year of age. For ten camels two sheep, and the rate goes up at each stage of five extra camels.
For 25 camels the rate is a she-camel of one year of age, or a male camel who has passed two years of age. For 36 camels a she-camel of 2 years, and for 46, one over 3 years.
As for dairies and fisheries, they should be treated as commercial ventures, and the same that applies to business applies to them.
Proposal to a married woman
Q. Is it permissible for someone to propose to you while you are still married? I received a proposal from an Indian who lives in Riyadh. I broke off all ties with him.
Did I do the right thing?
H. Kader
A. You certainly have done the right thing. For a man to propose to a married woman is so disrespectful of her, her values, faith and morality. Such a person is better avoided at all times. Indeed, it is not permissible to propose to a widow while she is in her waiting period, which extends for four months and ten days in the normal situation. The maximum that one can do during this period is to drop a hint, but no proposal may be made. How could a proposal be made to someone who is still married?
