For purposes of this chapter:
(1) “Agent” means any person that performs services for another person under an express or implied agreement. A person may be an agent without receiving compensation for services.
(2) “Agriculture” means the production of plants and animals useful to humans, including all forms of farm products and farm production.
(3) “Broker” means any person that negotiates the purchase or sale of any material. A broker may or may not handle either the material which is involved or the proceeds of a sale.
(4) “Certificate” means a document authorized or prepared by an authorized federal or state regulatory official that affirms, declares, or verifies that a plant or other regulated article meets phytosanitary (quarantine), nursery inspection, pest freedom, plant registration or certification, or other legal requirements. Such documents are known by their purpose of issuance and include: phytosanitary certificate (for the purpose of verifying compliance with phytosanitary (quarantine) requirements); nursery inspection certificate (for the purpose of verifying compliance with nursery inspection and pest freedom standards); registration or certification tags, or seals (for the purpose of verifying compliance with registration or certification requirements).
(5) “Certification” means the act by the Department of affirming, declaring, or verifying compliance with phytosanitary (quarantine), nursery inspection, pest freedom, plant registration or certification, or any other set of legal requirements.
(6) “Chain store” means any business with 1 or more retail outlets that sells plants, plant material, or nursery stock and which is owned by a common parent business entity.
(7) “Commission merchant” means any person that receives on consignment or solicits any material from a licensee, producer, or producer’s agent or accepts material in trust for purposes of sale and sells or resells any material on commission or for a fee.
(8) “Consignee” means any person to whom any plant, nursery stock, horticultural product, or similar item is shipped for handling, sale, resale, or other purpose.
(9) “Consignor” means any person that ships or delivers to a consignee any plant, nursery stock, horticultural product, or similar item for handling, planting, sale, resale, or any other purpose.
(10) “Dangerously injurious plant pest” means a plant pest that constitutes a significant threat to the agricultural, forest, or horticultural interests of this State, or the State’s general environmental quality.
(11) “Dealer” means any person that obtains title to, or possession, control, or delivery of, any plant, plant material, or nursery stock, from a producer for the purpose of resale.
(12) “Department” means the Department of Agriculture of this State and includes its officers, inspectors, employees, agents, or representatives.
(13) “Florist” includes a person or business engaged in the production or sale, wholesale or retail, of plants, plant materials, or nursery stock for temporary, semi-permanent, seasonal, or permanent, indoor or outdoor use.
(14) “Garden center” includes a business establishment engaged in the year round, retail sale of plants, plant material, or nursery stock from a specific, permanent sales location.
(15) “Greenhouse” includes an establishment or business engaged in the production of plants, plant material, or nursery stock within a climate controlled structure, for distribution beyond on-site or personal use.
(16) “Grower” includes any person that raises, grows, or propagates, for profit or other reasons, outdoors or indoors, any horticultural product, nursery stock, or plant.
(17) “Hold order” means an order or notice written by the Department to the owner or person in charge or in possession of a premises, plant, conveyance, or article infested or infected with or exposed to infestation or infection of a dangerously injurious plant pest, making it unlawful to move the aforementioned article unless treated in accordance with the Department’s prescribed procedures.
(18) “Horticultural product” means those products stated in Group 18 of the United States Department of Labor Standard Industrial Classification Manual which are grown under cover or outdoors, including bulbs, flowers, shrubbery, florist greens, fruit stock, floral products, nursery stock, ornamental plants, potted plants, roses, seed, Christmas trees, fruits, food crops grown in greenhouses, vegetables, and horticultural specialties not otherwise specified.
(19) “Infected” means a plant that has been determined by the Department to be contaminated with an infectious, transmissible, or contagious pest or so exposed to the aforementioned that contamination can reasonably be expected to exist. This includes disease conditions, regardless of their mode of transmission or any disorder of plants which manifest symptoms which, after investigation are determined by a federal or state pest prevention agency, to be characteristic of an infectious, transmissible, or contagious disease.
(20) “Infested” means a plant that has been determined by the Department to be contaminated by a dangerously injurious plant pest, or so exposed to the aforementioned that contamination can reasonably be expected to exist.
(21) “Landscaper” means any person that keeps at a premises, or procures for transplantation, nursery stock for installation on the property of another person.
(22) “Mail-order merchant” includes any person, dealer, or producer that sells or markets, wholesale or retail, any of its orders or business by drop shipment, catalog, telemarketing, telephone, mail-order, online sales, or other indirect means.
(23) “Mark” means a conspicuous official indicator affixed by the Department, for purposes of identification or separation, to, on, around, or near, plants or plant material, known or suspected to be, infected or infested with a dangerously injurious plant pest or determined to be a public nuisance. This includes paint, markers, tags, seals, stickers, tape, signs, or placards.
(24) “Move” means to ship, offer for shipment, receive for transport, carry or, in any manner whatsoever, convey, or relocate a regulated plant, plant material, or nursery stock, from 1 place to another.
(25) “Nursery” means any location where nursery stock is grown, propagated, stored, or sold; or any location from which nursery stock is distributed direct to a customer. (See “Sales location.”)
(26) “Nursery license” means a document issued by the Department authorizing a person to engage in a nursery or nursery related business at a particular location under a specified business name.
(27) “Nursery stock” means any plant for planting, propagation, or ornamentation, including:
a. All plants, trees, shrubs, vines, perennials grafts, cuttings, buds, clones, and seedlings that may be sold for propagation, whether cultivated or wild, and all viable parts of these plants.
b. Any other plant or plant part, including cut Christmas trees or any nonhardy plant or plant part, including annuals, bedding plants, and vegetable plants.
(28) “Owner” includes the person, persons, family, group, firm, association, business, company, incorporated entity, or organization with the legal right of possession, proprietorship of, or responsibility for the property or place where any of the regulated articles as defined in this chapter are to be found, or person that is in possession of, in proprietorship of, or has responsibility for the regulated articles.
(29) “Person” includes any individual, family, firm, association, group, business, company, incorporated entity, or organization.
(30) “Pest” includes any biotic agent (any living agent capable of reproducing itself) that is known to cause damage or harm to agriculture or the environment.
(31) “Plant” includes any part of a plant, tree, aquatic plant, plant material, shrub, vine, fruit, rhizome, vegetable, seed, bulb, stolon, tuber, corm, pip, cutting, scion, bud, graft, or fruit pit, including:
a. Agricultural commodities: plant materials including any horticultural product.
b. Nursery stock.
c. Noncultivated or feral plants, gathered from the environment.
d. Plants produced by tissue culture, cloning, or from stem cell cultures or other prepared media culture.
(32) “Plant pest” includes any pest of plants, agricultural commodities, horticultural products, nursery stock, or noncultivated plants. This includes insects, snails, nematodes, fungi, viruses, bacterium, microorganisms, mycoplasma like organisms, weeds, plants, or parasitic higher plants.
(33) “Preclearance” means an agreement between quarantine officials of exporting and importing states to pass items that include plants or plant material through quarantine by allowing the exporting state to inspect the plants preshipment, rather than the importing state inspecting the shipment on arrival.
(34) “Producer” includes any person that raises, grows or propagates, for profit or other reasons, outdoors or indoors, any horticultural product, nursery stock, or plant.
(35) “Quarantine” means a legal instrument duly imposed or enacted by the Department as a means for mitigating pest risk. These actions include confinement or restriction of entry, movement, shipment, or transportation of plants known or suspected to be infected or infested with some dangerously injurious plant pests.
(36) “Registration” means the official recording of a growing location, person, plant, sales location, or any other thing or place as one that has met specified requirements and therefore eligible for a particular activity, operation, or purpose.
(37) “Roadside market” includes a business engaged in the retail sale of plants, plant material, or nursery stock on a seasonal basis and which may operate from a specific sales location or multiple mobile locations.
(38) “Sales location” means every location from which nursery stock is delivered directly to a customer.
(39) “Secretary” means the Secretary of the Department or the Secretary’s designee.
(40) “Sell” includes offer for sale, expose for sale, possess for sale, exchange, barter, or trade.
(41) “Shipment” means any article or thing which is, may be, or has been transported or conveyed from 1 place to another.