School feeding in Federal Institutes: characterization and analysis of food acquisitions from family farming

Abstract

Objective The Federal Institutes of Education, Science, and Technology provide Basic Education and, thus, must execute the National School Feeding Program. The study aimed to characterize school feeding in these institutes, focusing on the purchase of food from family farming. Methods Cross-sectional study with Brazilian Federal Institutes that offer Basic Education courses. The characteristics of purchases from family farming in 2019 were analyzed, as well as the type of management of the school food service, the presence of a nutritionist in the unit acting as technical manager, and the presence of a canteen. Pearson’s chi-square test was used to analyze the association between the variables, adopting a statistical significance level of 5%. Results A total of 171 campuses, distributed in the five Brazilian regions, participated in the study. Among the participants in the survey, 35.1% did not offer any type of food to their students. The percentage of Federal Institutes that carried out acquisitions from family farming was 48%. The presence of a nutritionist was verified in 33.9% of the campuses and associated with food purchases from family farming. The type of food service management was shown to be related to the diversity of the purchases and the main categories of purchased foods. Conclusion The results demonstrate the importance of monitoring the school feeding policy at the federal level, being possible to characterize the school feeding in the Federal Institutes, also showing that more than half of the sample did not make purchases from family farming.