Hi Kate,
I presume this is related to 11.7.4.v
v. An environmental monitoring program shall be in place for high risk areas. At a minimum, a written
procedure detailing the applicable pathogens or indicator organisms to test for that industry, the
number of samples to be taken and the frequency of sampling and corrective actions shall be
documented. The responsibility and methods shall be documented and implemented. A sampling
schedule shall be prepared.
from the Guidance -
An environmental monitoring program (EMP) is a program which includes pathogen swabbing to detect risk in
the sanitary conditions of the processing environment and is a verification of the effectiveness of the pathogen
controls that a management facility has in place for high risk foods (refer Appendix 2: Glossary of Terms).
Swabbing must include not only the smooth, accessible parts of the process, but also the transfer points,
bearings, etc., where product is likely to build up.
Yr product / process is unknown which makes comments a bit difficult.
SQF users may have more direct advice but IMEX the EMP sampling locations are based on a zoning setup / risk assessment and can then be rotated according to a logical plan using a selected frequency, eg monthly. ie you simply write the sampling procedure to correspond to yr intended actions.
Not sure if that helps, actual SQF users may offer more..