Microbiological Analyses of Raw Milk Cheeses from Walloon Farms

For several years now, the Walloon Region has been supporting a project to help and follow farmers through their diversification activities: la Cellule Qualité Produits Fermiers (CQPF). Among their partners, the Process and Quality Engineering Laboratory in the Department of Food Technology of the Agricultural University of Gembloux is in charge of the hygienic supervision, ensuring the implementation of self-evaluation systems based on the HACCP principles and good hygiene practice guidelines. For four years, the CQPF has been following almost a hundred Walloon cheesemaking artisans using raw milk from cow, goat and ewe. According to the Commission Regulation (EC) No 2073/2005 on microbiological criteria for foodstuffs, analyses of microbiological pathogens have to be performed regularly to guarantee healthy and hazard free raw milk products. The results of microbiological analyses from raw milk cheeses of our artisans between January 2007 and June 2010 are presented below. We were interested on showing firstly, if the quality of the Walloon cheeses follow the standards of food safety criteria established by the European regulation, and secondly, if there is a trend for pathogen contamination throughout the year.