On May 2006, the European Commission officially designated the French agency for food, environmental and occupational health safety, ANSES, as the European Union Reference Laboratory (EURL) for Listeria monocytogenes.
The activities of the EURL are handled by ANSES's Laboratory for Food Safety.

Regulation (EU) 2017/625 defines the role and duties of the European Union Reference Laboratories. The EURL for feed and food shall be responsible for the proper use by the National Reference Laboratories (NRL) of the methods set down in the Commission Regulations. Commission Regulation (EC) No 2073/2005 lays down the microbiological criteria for Listeria monocytogenes. The list of the  European Union Reference Laboratories is available on the DG SANTE website.

Duties of the EURL for Listeria monocytogenes:

    ❶ PROVIDING ANALYTICAL METHODS

    ❷ COORDINATING THE APPLICATION OF METHODS BY ORGANISING COMPARATIVE TESTING

    ❸ COORDINATING ARRANGEMENTS FOR NEW METHODS AND PROVIDING INFORMATION ABOUT ADVANCES

    ❹ CONDUCTING TRAINING COURSES

    ❺ PROVIDING SCIENTIFIC AND TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE TO THE EUROPEAN COMMISSION

    ❻ COLLABORATING WITH THIRD COUNTRIES

Due to their scientific and technical proficiency in the areas of animal health, public health and livestock research, the European Union Reference Laboratories (EURLs) have been designated and, without prejudice to any other relevant European legislation, are referred to in Commission Regulation (EC) No 882/2004.

Guidance documents

Sampling processing areas:  NEW  EURL Lm Technical Guidance Document on sampling the food processing area and equipment for the detection of Listeria monocytogenes V4 2023-10-03
Measurement uncertainty: Guide on the implementation of the Standard EN ISO 19036:2019 for the estimation of measurement uncertainty associated with the enumeration of Campylobacter, coagulase positive staphylococci and Listeria monocytogenes in the food chain V1 2022-06-23 ► more information
Shelf-life studies of Listeria monocytogenes: EURL Lm Technical Guidance Document Lm shelf-life studies_V4 (01/07/2021) EURL Lm Guidance Document to evaluate the competence of laboratories implementing challenge tests and durability studies related to Lm in ready-to-eat foods (V3 – 10/02/2023) linked documents: EURL Lm - Report Storage temperature at consumer level v2 (06/06/2021) Calculator inter-batch variability and User's Guide: available on ISO portal Report of the development of a set of Listeria monocytogenes strains for conducting challenge tests (V0-20/12/2013)