Caribbean countries are meeting this week to discuss a new vision for school feeding programmes that is being promoted through regional and national interventions based on the fundamental elements of education for sustainability and the production of food for schools. The interventions aim at strengthening the process of how policies for food and nutritional education in schools are institutionalized in 17 countries across Latin America and the Caribbean, including Antigua and Barbuda, Grenada, Jamaica, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines.

The International Congress of School Feeding Programmes, being held from 3 – 5 October 2017 in Brasilia, Brazil, will bring together nutrition and education experts from Brazil, Latin American and Caribbean countries to discuss and disseminate good practices, as well as provide the necessary inputs for building of knowledge of content, methodologies and didactic-pedagogical procedures necessary for the development of qualitative actions of food and nutritional education in schools.

The Congress will focus on three main areas and is expected to generate the opportunity to meet and discuss different perspectives and approaches of the main theme: Food and Nutrition Education. Discussions will be held through lectures, workshops and exhibitions on topics such as the development of Food and Nutrition Education concepts, methodologies, best practices, and policies for school feeding programmes, as well as national developments and their impact on School Feeding Policies.

Seventeen countries from across Latin America and the Caribbean (Antigua and Barbuda, Bolivia, Colombia, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Paraguay, Peru, Dominican Republic, Venezuela, Belize, Jamaica, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines and Grenada) are expected to participate in and benefit from these discussions during the conference, which is being held within the framework of a regional project entitled “Strengthening School Feeding Programmes in Latin America and the Caribbean.”

Since 2009, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the Brazilian Government, represented by the National Fund for the Development of Education (FNDE / MEC) and the Brazilian Cooperation Agency (ABC / MRE), under the International Cooperation Programme, have been carrying out this regional project as a part of the agenda of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC), and with the aim of achieving Sustainable Development Goal 2 on eradicating hunger, achieving food security and improving nutrition.