PHOENIX β An Arizona cattle rancher wants to ensure that anything sold to Arizonans as βmeatβ comes from something with at least two legs, if not more.
Rep. David Cook, R-Globe, seeks to make it illegal to βmisrepresentβ any product not derived from a harvested livestock or poultry animal as meat.
His proposed legislation, House Bill 2044, would define that act as the use of βany untrue, misleading or deceptive oral or written statement, advertisement, label, display, picture, illustration or sample.β
βItβs about truth in labeling,β he said.
Cook said heβs not trying to put a dent in the market for things like soy burgers. And the commercial Impossible Burger would remain legal to sell, complete with what could be mouth-watering pictures of the product.
βThe βburgerβ is not the meat,β he said. ββBurgerβ is just what you grind up. It can be soy, it can be whatever.β
Itβs the word βmeatβ that Cook is trying to protect from βwhatβs being done in laboratories and stuff where meat does not come from a carcass,β he said. βYou can call it a βburger.β You cannot call it βmeat.ββ
Similarly prohibited by HB 2044 would be any other words suggesting that what is being offered for sale or consumption has some relation with an animal that once lived.
βThey canβt call it βground beef,ββ Cook said.
Companies would still be able to sell nonmeat βnuggetsβ to patrons β as long as they are not labeled as chicken.
βWhen you walk up to a meat counter, you know what youβre buying,β Cook said. βYou know what you are putting in your body. You know what youβre consuming and what you are paying for.β
Cook proposed similar legislation last year, but with a twist: It also would have prohibited the use of the word βmilkβ on any product that did not come from a lactating animal, effectively saying that products could not be called βsoy milkβ or βalmond milk.β The House voted 36-22 to kill that measure.
This time, Cook said, the dairy farmers are on their own. But he questioned whether such a measure could get legislative approval.
βTheyβre 15, 20 years too late,β Cook said, noting the plethora of nondairy βmilkβ products already on store shelves.
As for meat, he said, βWe want to make sure weβre out in front of this thing before it even becomes an issue.β