O Programa Nacional de Alimentação Escolar (PNAE) no município de Catalão (GO)

Abstract

The National School Feeding Program (PNAE) is a State program, with an established law, which guarantees universal school feeding to all students in the public school system. A point of law no. 11,947/09 It is worth noting that 30% of school meals must be purchased from local family farming. In Catalão, the PNAE serves more than 16 thousand students and the associations and individual farmers serve municipal and state schools and the educational institution of the federal network. The objective of the work was to understand the functioning of the National School Feeding Program (PNAE) in the city of Catalão. Bibliographies and analysis of important documents were used to understand school feeding and family farming. It was not possible to carry out field activities due to the suspension of some activities in the public sector due to the pandemic caused by Covid-19. Through the adopted methodologies, the importance of the PNAE for the permanence of families on the land was detected, as well as the relevance of the families remaining on the land for the perpetuation of the biocultural identity. Small properties are important for environmental preservation and control of the agroecosystem. This preservation is visible because there is no need to clear new areas for agriculture, as the large producers do, and the use of natural agriculture, with no or almost no use of poisons. The municipality of Catalão has, therefore, almost a thousand family establishments. This strength of family producers is considerable for the permanence of this remarkable public policy. The dissemination of public notices is very timid and could also have a greater reach of the proposals launched by the municipality, if there were better dissemination, through the City Hall, on its social networks and radio and television channels.