Food and nutritional safety: analysis of food trading in Tangará - Rio Grande do Norte

Abstract

Objective: To know the main characteristics of the dynamics of food trading and supply in the Municipal district of Tangará/RN. Methods: A cross-sectional study in which forty four establishments of food trading were studied, such as: butcher shops, grocery stores, supermarkets, bakeries and market-stalls at street markets. Semi-structured questionnaires were applied broaching the relations with suppliers, consumers, food sale, losses; sale strategies and trading difficulties. The data were analyzed according to the frequency of the answer, for each type of establishment. Results: Among the main difficulties referred on the research, the insufficient income of the population and the lack of structure and organization of street markets were the most referred; among the main proposals defined by the dealers for the improvement of local trade, stood out the rise of population income through more employment generation. Conclusion: The diagnosis in the municipal district of Tangará/ RN, focused in the ambit of trading, provided subsidies for the planning of Public Policies, besides favouring the knowledge of data that characterize the agents who join in the food and agricultural chain, that is, as much as agriculture producers, as those that participate on the intermediation between the production and the consumption.