Overview

The Food Additive Safety and Transparency Act of 2026, authored by Assemblymember Dawn Addis (D-San Luis Obispo), requires three transparency and safety reforms to address these problems:

• Through the ‘Generally Recognized as Safe’ loophole in federal food safety law, the FDA does not know all the substances that companies have added to our foods, let alone if those chemicals are safe. More about the problems with GRAS here.
• Food companies are legally allowed to hide ingredients from consumers and regulators under vague terms like “natural flavor,” “artificial flavor,” “spices,” and “artificial color”.
• Food companies can and do put cancer-causing flavors and other hazardous chemicals in food, sometimes using the ‘Generally Recognized as Safe’ loophole. Some have been prohibited only after prolonged advocacy efforts like petitions to the FDA and lawsuits.

Public evidence of safety for new chemicals

Whether for direct additives or for indirect additives coming from food packaging and processing, the bill requires food companies to provide evidence that the chemicals are safe, if they have not already been found safe by the FDA pre-market review process. The evidence will be placed on a public database. The database will also contain ingredient disclosures (see below), and ‘Generally Recognized as Safe’ notices filed in the federal process. New food additives being placed on the market after January 1, 2027 must go through the FDA premarket review before being sold in California.

Exclusion of cancer-causing substances

AB 2034 prohibits carcinogens from obtaining a ‘Generally Recognized as Safe’ designation in California. If a chemical is shown to cause cancer in humans or animals, it cannot have a ‘GRAS’ designation and is prohibited from foods sold in the state, even if it has been approved by the FDA.

Full ingredient disclosure for flavors, spices, and colors

This bill ends the use of vague terms like “natural flavor,” “artificial flavor,” “spices,” and “artificial color”. Companies must fully disclose all ingredients on the food product’s list of ingredients or publicly disclose those ingredients in a state database managed by CDPH.

Contact

Nancy Buermeyer, Breast Cancer Prevention Partners Director of Program & Policy

Further Resources

• Author Factsheet
• Bill language (select ‘Today’s Law As Amended’)
  https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billCompareClient.xhtml?bill_id=202520260AB2034
• Bill status (select ‘Status’ or ‘Votes’) https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billCompareClient.xhtml?bill_id=202520260AB2034
• The federal ‘Generally Recognized as Safe’ loophole allows secret toxic chemicals in our food

Supporting Organizations:

• Alpha-gal Alliance Action Fund
• Allergy & Asthma Network
• Bay Area Community Resources
• Breast Cancer Prevention Partners
• California Farmer Justice Collaborative
• CALPIRG (California Public Interest Research Group)
• Center for Environmental Health
• Ceres Community Project
• CleanEarth4Kids.org
• Clean Water Action
• Consumer Federation of America
• Consumer Reports
• Courage California
• CURED (Campaign Urging Research for Eosinophilic Disease)
• Elijah-Alavi Foundation
• Families Advocating For Chemical and Toxics Safety
• Food and Water Watch
• FPIES (Food Protein-Induced Enterocolitis Syndrome) Foundation
• Harvard Law School Food Law and Policy Clinic
• Healthy Food America
• Mamavation
• National Consumers League
• Partnership for a Healthier America
• Pesticide Action and Agroecology Network
• Rising Communities
• San Francisco Bay Physicians for Social Responsibility
• Sierra Harvest
• Strategic Training Initiative for the Prevention of Eating Disorders
• United Parents & Students

Footnotes 

[1] Vom Saal FS, Vandenberg LN. Update on the Health Effects of Bisphenol A: Overwhelming Evidence of Harm. Endocrinology. 2021 Mar 1;162(3):bqaa171. doi: 10.1210/endocr/bqaa171. PMID: 33516155; PMCID: PMC7846099. 

[2] “Receipt Deceit: Toxic Chemicals in Receipt Paper” Ecology Center, 2023 https://www.ecocenter.org/our-work/healthy-stuff-lab/reports/receipt-deceit-toxic-chemicals-receipt-paper 

[3] “Touching 1 Receipt for 10 Seconds Results in Exposure to the Chemical BPS Above the Safe Limit.” Center for Environmental Health. 2025 https://ceh.org/latest/press-releases/touching-1-receipt-for-10-seconds-results-in-exposure-to-the-chemical-bps-above-the-safe-limit/ 

[4] https://www.saferstates.org/press-room/washington-states-first-in-the-nation-ban-on-toxic-bisphenols-in-receipts-takes-effect/
https://www.commerce.wa.gov/washington-state-eliminates-harmful-chemicals-from-thermal-receipts/