Sixty years of the National Food Program in Brazil

Abstract

A B S T R A C TSchool meals were introduced in the Brazilian political agenda by a group of scholars known as ' nutrition scientists ' in the 1940s. In 1955, the Campanha de Merenda Escolar, the first official school food program, was stablished, and sixty years after its inception, school food in Brazil stands as a decentralised public policy, providing services to students enrolled in public schools, which involve the Brazilian federal government, twentyseven federative units, and their 5,570 municipalities. Throughout its history, school food has gone through many stages that reflect the social transformations in Brazil: from a campaign to implement school food focused on the problem of malnutrition and the ways to solve it, to the creation of a universal public policy relying on social participation and interface between other modern, democratic, and sustainable policies, establishing a strategy for promoting food and nutrition security, development, and social protection. In this article, the School Food Program is analyzed from the perspective of four basic structures that support it as public policy: the formal structure, consisting of legal milestones that regulated the program; substantive structure, referring to the public and private social actors involved; material structure, regarding the way in which Brazil sponsors the program; and finally, the symbolic structure, consisting of knowledge, values, interests, and rules that legitimatize the policy.

Design of a school randomized trial for nudging students towards healthy diet and physical activity to prevent obesity

“…In Brazil, the National School Food Program stipulates that all public schools should offer no cost daily meals for students, including fruits and vegetables on menus. [ 37 ] However, data from a previous research carried out in the same locality of the present study [ 25 ] indicate that a percentage of more than 30% of students do not consume the food offered at school.…”

Compra de alimentos da agricultura familiar pelo Programa Nacional de Alimentação Escolar (PNAE): estudo transversal com o universo de municípios brasileiros

“…Em relação ao valor de recursos utilizados para a compra de alimentos da agricultura familiar sugere-se que as futuras comparações utilizem o sistema de prestação de contas do FNDE que à época desta pesquisa não recolhia tais informações. Acredita-se que o incremento da compra da agricultura familiar pelo PNAE pode apoiar-se no incentivo à assessoria técnica ao desenvolvimento deste modo de produção por meio do Programa Nacional de Fortalecimento da Agricultura Familiar (PRONAF) e no apoio à alimentação escolar prestado pelos Centros Colaboradores em Alimentação e Nutrição do Escolar ligados ao FNDE 38 .…”

Professional practice of dietitians in the Brazilian School Feeding Program: A multiple case study

“…Nogueira et al [30] analyzed the PNAE from four basic structures that support it as a public policy. The formal structure is composed of a program legislation; the substantive refers to the people involved (such as the dietitian); the material involves the funding of the Program by the government; and the symbolic is composed of the knowledge, values, interests and rules that legitimize the policy.…”