Report on temperatures of the food cold chain at consumer level in Europe

The cold chain is essential for guaranteeing the quality and safety of chilled foods. The final step of the cold chain, storage in domestic refrigerators, is mimicked in challenge tests assessing the growth potential and durability studies for chilled food products.
In recent years, few surveys have been carried out in Europe on the storage temperatures of domestic refrigerators. Gathering available data on this step is important since this storage condition can have a significant impact on the behaviour of Listeria monocytogenes (Lm) in ready-to-eat (RTE) foods and thus on the microbiological safety of chilled food products.
The European Union Reference Laboratory for Listeria monocytogenes (EURL Lm) has planned to reconsider the default temperature of the cold chain at consumer level (12°C) set out in Table 3 of the EURL Lm Technical Guidance Document for conducting shelf-life studies on L. monocytogenes in ready-to-eat foods –Version 3 of 6 June 2014 – Amendment 1 of 21 February 2019.
This work was conducted in 2020 with the collaboration of a working group of volunteering 8 NRLs: Marie POLET (Sciensano, BE-NRL), Jens KIRK ANDERSEN (DTU Food, DK-NRL), Bernadette HICKEY (Department of Agriculture, Food and Marine, IE-NRL), Luigi IANNETTI (IZS Teramo, IT-NRL), Paul IN’T VELD (NWVA, NL Competent Authority and c/o NL-NRL), Gonçalo Nieto ALMEIDA (Iniav, PT-NRL), Linda EVERIS (Campden BRI, c/o UK-NRL), Monica RICÃO CANELHAS (SLV, SE-NRL).
In order to be as realistic as possible, when conducting shelf-life studies, EURL Lm reviewed available data in Europe on storage temperatures of domestic refrigerators based on (a) data from national surveys and (b) from scientific literature in the recent years.
The collected data was considered in order to (i) get a better knowledge of refrigerator temperatures at consumer level and (ii) to better assess the shelf-life of RTE food regarding Listeria monocytogenes.