Fortalecimento da agricultura familiar e Segurança Alimentar e Nutricional em Acarape (CE): potencial e desafios para a inclusão de alimentos locais em políticas públicas

Abstract

The inclusion of traditional foods in public Food and Nutritional Security policies represents an important contribution to local and sustainable development. Therefore, the present study aimed to investigate the food biodiversity of the municipality of Acarape, located in the Maciço de Baturité microregion, in the state of Ceará, in order to identify traditional foods with the potential to be used as instruments to strengthen family farming in the region through the acquisition of products through the National School Food Program and the Institutional Purchase of the Food Acquisition Program (PAA-CI). This is a study with a qualitative and descriptive approach, which had as its central axis the ethnographic study. The research found that corn cultivation occupies a prominent position in local agriculture and that with the knowledge and know-how present in corn foods - such as tamale and hominy - local farming families transform the production of traditional foods into income, in addition to rescuing and building identity and memory, in a process that brings together family and social relationships.