HB 135 North Carolina House · 2025-2026 Session

Misbranding/Cell-Cultured Meat/Western North Carolina Donations.

HB 135 establishes labeling requirements for "manufactured-protein food products," which include items made from cell cultures, insects, or plants that resemble traditional meat or poultry. The bill mandates that if these products use identifying meat or poultry terms, their labels must also prominently display a "qualifying term" like "cell-cultured" or "plant-based" in a specific font size and location to prevent misbranding. Additionally, the bill aims to prohibit public educational institutions from purchasing certain food products and proposes an environmental investment assessment on specific animal-derived and analogous food products.

Bill status died 1 of 4 stages cleared

Introduction

Feb 2025

Committee Review

Floor Vote

Governor

Introduced Feb 17, 2025 Last action Apr 29, 2025

Maddy AI version diff · 2 comparisons

What changed between versions

Edition 1 → Edition 2 · 7 edits

MODERATE

The bill was completely rewritten to shift focus from prohibiting schools from buying meat and imposing environmental fees on farmers to requiring clear labels on cell-cultured food products and establishing a voluntary donation program to help farms affected by Hurricane Helene. This change alters the bill's primary purpose from consumer protection and revenue generation to transparency and disaster relief.

Scope change

The bill's scope expanded to include a new voluntary donation program for hurricane relief and a specific audit for disaster relief efficiency, while removing provisions that banned community colleges and schools from purchasing certain food products.

REQUIREMENT

Provisions prohibiting community colleges, universities, and public schools from purchasing certain food products were removed.

A new requirement was added stating that cell-cultured food products are misbranded if they are not labeled in accordance with a new section (G.S. 106-549.28A).

FISCAL

The requirement to establish an environmental investment assessment on meat, poultry, egg, and dairy products was removed.

A new voluntary donation program was added to support farms affected by Hurricane Helene.

Funds were appropriated for a farm and forestry disaster relief efficiency audit.

DEFINITION

The definition of 'Identifying meat term' was updated to explicitly include phrases used individually, as portmanteaus, or as compound words.

New definitions for 'Qualifying term' (disclosing cell-cultured status) and 'Ratite' (specific bird types) were added.

Floor votes

How they voted

No floor votes recorded yet.

Full legislative history

Actions timeline

Total actions

Key actions

Committee

Apr 29, 2025

Committee

Re-ref Com On Commerce and Economic Development

lower

Apr 29, 2025

Lower · Passed

Reptd Fav Com Substitute

lower

Apr 3, 2025

Committee

Re-ref to the Com on Health, if favorable, Commerce and Economic Development, if favorable, Agriculture and Environment, if favorable, Rules, Calendar, and Operations of the House

lower

Feb 18, 2025

Committee

Ref to the Com on Finance, if favorable, Health, if favorable, Commerce and Economic Development, if favorable, Agriculture and Environment, if favorable, Rules, Calendar, and Operations of the House

lower

Feb 17, 2025

Introduced

Filed

lower

3 primary · 16 co-sponsors