Georgia § 27-4-197 - Shellfish sanitation program; requirements as to shipment of shellfish.

§ 27-4-197. Shellfish sanitation program; requirements as to shipment of shellfish.

The department and the Department of Agriculture shall conduct a shellfish program sufficient to be certified by the United States Food and Drug Administration for interstate shipment of shellfish produced in this state. It shall be unlawful for any person handling shellfish for purposes of sale or shipment to fail to keep such shellfish in clean barrels, bags, crates, baskets, or other containers as prescribed by the Department of Agriculture. It shall be unlawful to fail to attach to each such container a tag approved by the Department of Agriculture or to mark containers of shucked shellfish with mandatory information as described by the Department of Agriculture. It shall be unlawful to possess shellfish which are not properly tagged or labeled according to this Code section. Such tags or labels shall indicate the information as required by the Department of Agriculture. It shall be unlawful to affix tags issued to a certified dealer onto containers of another. Uncertified master harvesters shall tag harvested shellfish in a manner as prescribed by the department according to the guidelines of the National Shellfish Sanitation Program. It shall be unlawful to ship or possess commercial quantities of shellfish unless certified by the Department of Agriculture. It shall be unlawful to possess shellfish from out-of-state sources unless those shellfish were purchased from certified dealers. It shall be unlawful to ship shellfish through Georgia unless certified. Certified dealers are those permitted to handle shellfish according to the guidelines of the National Shellfish Sanitation Program. The department may issue permission to uncertified firms to take and possess shellfish. Such permission may be issued upon such conditions as the department determines are in accordance with current, sound principles of wildlife research and management. (Code 1981, § 27-4-197 , enacted by Ga. L. 1991, p. 693, § 6; Ga. L. 2019, p. 619, § 1/HB 501.) The 2019 amendment, effective May 6, 2019, for purposes of promulgating rules and regulations and effective March 1, 2020 for all other purposes, substituted "approved by" for "obtained from" in the middle of the second sentence in subsection (b); in subsection (c), deleted "or to fail to surrender unused tags to the Department of Agriculture upon termination of certification or master collecting permit" following "another" at the end of the first sentence and added the second sentence; and deleted "for mariculture purposes" following "shellfish" at the end of the fifth sentence of subsection (d). Cross references. - Sanitary handling of fish and seafood, § 26-2-315 et seq. Code Commission notes. - Pursuant to Code Section 28-9-5, in 1991, "out-of-state" was substituted for "out of state" in the second sentence of subsection (d). Editor's notes. - Ga. L. 2019, p. 619, § 3/HB 501, not codified by the General Assembly, provides: "This Act shall become effective upon its approval by the Governor or upon its becoming law with such approval for purposes of promulgating rules and regulations necessary to administer the provisions of this Act and shall become effective on March 1, 2020, for all other purposes." This Act was signed by the Governor on May 6, 2019.