School food in child daycare centers: Poor in macro and micronutrients

Background & Aims School food nutritional composition is important to guarantee the feeding and nutritional health of the children who attend early education institutions. In this way, we aimed to evaluate the school feeding, about the supply of energy and nutrients of school meals and verify compliance with the recommendations of the Brazilian National School Feeding Program (PNAE). Methods Cross-sectional study that evaluated the school food supply to children from six-to-56 months old in child daycare centers, from February to September 2014, for two non-consecutive days, by means of direct individualized weighing of all meals prepared by the schools. Energy, macronutrients, calcium, magnesium, iron, zinc, vitamins A and C, and fiber were analyzed. Data were shown as median, interquartile range and compared to PNAE recommendation. Results We found that 767 children participated in the study. In full-time care, only the supply of calcium and zinc to 6–11 months old met the minimal recommendations of PNAE, whilst for 1–3 years old children, only vitamin C and zinc reach that. In part-time care, none of the nutrients for children from 1-3 years met the minimum recommended by PNAE, whilst for children older than 3 years, only the supply of vitamin C met the recommendations. Conclusion The current evaluation shows that the nutrient supply was insufficient to reach the desired PNAE's parameters in both, part- and full time. In order to promote an adequate nutritional status and healthy food consumption, the need for improvement of school nutrient supply is indisputable. Furthermore, this study points to the need for monitoring the quantity and quality of the food supplied by the school, to guarantee the food and nutritional safety of this population.