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ARIZONA STATE SENATE
Fifty-Sixth Legislature, Second Regular Session
misbranding; misrepresenting; food products.
Purpose
Prohibits a person who places a label on a food product from intentionally misbranding or misrepresenting a product that is not derived from livestock or poultry as meat, a meat food product, poultry or a poultry product.
Background
Meat is the edible part of the muscle of cattle, sheep, swine, goats or equines which is skeletal or which is found in the tongue, in the diaphragm, in the heart or in the esophagus, with or without the accompanying and overlying fat, and the portions of bone, skin, sinew, nerve and blood vessels which normally accompany the muscle tissue and which are not separated from it in the process of dressing. Meat does not include the muscle found in the lips, snout or ears.
Misbranded applies to any carcass, part thereof, meat or meat food product under one or more circumstances, including: 1) the labeling is false or misleading in any particular; 2) the product is offered for sale under the name of another food; 3) the product is an imitation of another food, unless the label bears in contrasting color, and in type of uniform size and prominence, the word imitation and immediately thereafter, the name of the food imitated; 4) any word, statement or other information required to appear on the label or other labeling is not prominently placed thereon with such conspicuousness, as compared with other words, statements, designs or devices in the labeling, and in such terms as to render it likely to be read and understood by the ordinary individual under customary conditions of purchase and use; 5) the product purports to be or is represented as a food for which a definition and standard of identity or composition has been prescribed by rules of the Director of the Arizona Department of Agriculture, unless the product conforms to such definition and standard and bears the name of the food specified in the definition and standard (A.R.S. § 3-2001).
There is no anticipated fiscal impact to the state General Fund associated with this legislation.
Provisions
1. Prohibits a person who places a label on a food product from intentionally misbranding or misrepresenting a product that is not derived from livestock or poultry as meat, a meat food product, poultry or a poultry product through any activity, including misbranding or misrepresenting by:
a) affixing a false or misleading label on meat, a meat food product, poultry or a poultry product;
b) using a term that is the same or deceptively similar to a term that has been used or defined historically in reference to a specific meat food product or poultry product;
c) representing a product as meat, a meat food product, poultry or a poultry product if the product is a cell-cultured food product; or
d) representing a product as meat, a meat food product, poultry or a poultry product if the product is a synthetic product derived from a plant, insect or other source.
2. Allows the Department of Health Services to:
a) adopt rules to enforce the prohibition;
b) receive complaints and investigate violations of the prohibition;
c) employ personnel to investigate and enforce the prohibition or delegate investigation and enforcement authority to county health departments or the Weights and Measures Services Division of the Arizona Department of Agriculture;
d) seek and obtain injunctive relief or other civil relief to restrain and prevent violations of the prohibition and rules adopted by DHS; and
e) after a hearing, impose a civil penalty of up to $100,000 for each violation of the prohibition.
3. Specifies that each day a violation occurs is considered a separate offense.
4. Defines cell-cultured food product as any cultured animal tissue that is produced from in vitro animal cell cultures outside of the organism from which it is derived.
5. Defines deceptively similar as misleading to a reasonable person.
6. Defines Department and meat.
7. Becomes effective on the general effective date.
Prepared by Senate Research
February 13, 2024
RA/SDR/slp