Statistical aspects of food safety sampling

I. Jongenburger, H.M.W. den Besten, M.H. Zwietering*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleAcademicpeer-review

46 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

In food safety management, sampling is an important tool for verifying control. Sampling by nature is a stochastic process. However, uncertainty regarding results is made even greater by the uneven distribution of microorganisms in a batch of food. This article reviews statistical aspects of sampling and describes the impact of distributions on the sampling results. Five different batch contamination scenarios are illustrated: a homogeneous batch, a heterogeneous batch with high- or low-level contamination, and a batch with localized high- or low-level contamination. These batch contamination scenarios showed that sampling results have to be interpreted carefully, especially when heterogeneous and localized contamination in food products is expected.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)479-503
JournalAnnual Review of Food Science and Technology
Volume6
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2015

Keywords

  • microbiological risk-assessment
  • escherichia-coli o157
  • microbial counts
  • probable number
  • salmonella-typhimurium
  • listeria-monocytogenes
  • hygienic performances
  • united-states
  • distributions
  • water

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