Institutional markets in family farming: difficulties and challenges

Abstract

Family farming has nowadays the possibility to access the institutional market, which is a way to approach family-based production to the consumer through the National School Feeding Programme (NSFP) and the Food Acquisition Programme (FAP). This study aims to describe the trajectory of access to these markets in the unicipality of Mineiros, state of Goiás, Brazil, identifying the main difficulties and challenges and highlighting the social actors involved in the process. As a methodology, this study sought to perform a literature review and a documentary research in institutional reports, documents and official websites of the institutions related to agriculture in this municipality. The results show that access to NSFP took place in 2012, in an incipient way, by selling products to the public schools in the order of 0.63 percent and, in 2013, sale projects of NSFP and FAP have reached the total amount of 90,958 kilograms of food. It is noteworthy that there is a local cooperation network between institutions involved in family farming, and that there are difficulties and challenges to be faced, such as the organization of production, which is focused on diversification, in order to meet the demand, respect farmers’ culture, meet the sanitary requirements, and organize the logistics of production.