The state legislature of the U.S. state of Mississippi has passed a bill expanding the state’s seafood-labeling law, sending the legislation to the state’s governor to be signed into law.
"We are trying to do everything that we can to help promote seafood [and] to help promote the brand of Gulf fresh seafood, not just for shrimp, not just for oysters, but for all seafood," Mississippi Senator Scott DeLano (R-Biloxi) told WLOX.
Mississippi already has a law on the books banning companies from implying that foreign-origin shrimp or crawfish is a domestic product, but the new legislation greatly expands what products fall under the labeling requirements. The expanded bill would cover all seafood products, requiring restaurants, retailers, processors, and wholesalers to label whether their products are “domestic” or “imported.”
“We need to win back that trust,” Biloxi, Mississippi-based chef and restaurant owner Austin Sumrall, told the Biloxi Sun Herald. “I think laws for labeling and keeping people honest are the only way forward.”
The bill has received vocal support from the seafood industry, as well, following an incident in Biloxi, where a local seafood restaurant, Mary Mahoney’s Old French House, admitted to lying about where it was sourcing its seafood from. For multiple years, the restaurant purchased frozen imported fish from wholesaler QPS but labeled it as a locally sourced fish at a premium price. The restaurant was fined USD 149,000 (EUR 142,000) and placed on probation, while QPS was fined USD 500,000 (EUR 476,000) and placed on probation.
The U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) issued a bulletin in December 2024 reminding restaurants and retailers that it is illegal to mislead consumers into believing seafood sourced from foreign fisheries is a domestic product.
Before the bill passed in February of this year, the legislation was briefly held up in the Mississippi Senate, where lawmakers swapped the bill out for an amendment that would have instead established a task force to study the seafood-labeling proposal. Ultimately, both houses agreed to a compromise bill that keeps the original seafood-labeling requirements while also establishing the Mississippi Seafood Marketing Task Force to make recommendations to the legislature about marketing and producing seafood in Mississippi waters. The task force will need to produce a report for lawmakers by the end of 2026.
The bill has been sent to Governor Tate Reeves for his signature. Unless vetoed, the expanded law will go into effect 1 July.
Mississippi joins a slew of Southern states that have laws requiring establishments to highlight where they’re sourcing their seafood from.
Neighboring Louisiana already has such a law on the books, and Alabama passed a similar law covering delis and restaurants last year. The Georgia House recently passed its own seafood-labeling law, but it has yet to be voted on by the Senate.
