LAW AND INNOVATION IN PUBLIC PROCUREMENT: THE CASE OF THE NATIONAL SCHOOL FEEDING PROGRAM

This article analyzes the use of state purchasing power to acquire school feeding based on the case of the National School Feeding Program (Pnae). The main argument developed is that the legal and institutional arrangements by which public procurement is operationalized, depending on how they are mobilized, can contribute to the achievement of public policy objectives and government programs and, thus, can also delimit the contours of existing markets, or encourage the emergence of new markets. The case of Pnae shows that certain rules of the process of hiring suppliers - in particular a rule that provides for the simplification of the hiring process and the obligation to purchase 30% of the food for school meals of products produced by family agriculture, indigenous peoples and quilombolas - can increase the effectiveness of the realization of the right to adequate food and nutrition of students from public schools, as well as can catalyze the expansion of the food market, in particular by expanding sources of fresh, healthier food from a nutritional point of view.