From offices in Boise, Post Falls, Twin Falls, and Pocatello, TechHelp Specialists help Idaho manufacturers, food processors and entrepreneurs improve their competitiveness through continuous product and process innovation.

Determining Sanitation Effectiveness with a Robust Environmental Monitoring Program

A PEM program should test for a mix of indicator organisms and a mix of pathogens based on product susceptibility and risk

TechHelp is thrilled to share this snippet of an article written by our own, Janna Hamlett, and published in FoodSafety Magazine in December of 2022. 

A sanitation program is a key component of any food processor’s or food handler’s food safety plan. A well-written and well-executed sanitation program can mitigate, or reduce to an acceptable level, all three classifications of hazards (microbiological, chemical, and physical) in a hazard analysis. Sanitation is one of the four preventive controls (process controls, allergen, sanitation, and other) in the Preventive Controls for Human Food rule of the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA). Sanitation has long been a major prerequisite program for Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points (HACCP). Consequently, it is imperative that the sanitation program be functioning and performing according to expectations.

“A best practice when determining the timing of sample collection is to also vary the days and times of sampling locations.”

Janna Hamlett, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor at the University of Idaho Extension and a Food Processing Specialist with TechHelp, Idaho's Manufacturing Extension Partnership Center. She has over 15 years of experience in the food manufacturing industry, with a background in quality and operations management including numerous certifications in lean processing management, personnel safety, and food safety and quality programs.

Janna Hamlett of TechHelp and the University of Idaho

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