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Many people ask if it is true that the government provides basic food basket for the neediest families or if it is pure speculation. But if you stay with us and read this article until the end, we will clear up these and other doubts you may have.
The federal government has several social programs such as Family Allowance, which helps several families to have a little more dignity in terms of food, housing, clothing and other basic needs that arise in everyday life.
These programs are aimed at people who need additional income or have no income at all. But the fact is that some new programs are working and some have been modified and not widely publicized.
Before we talk about that, let's go over what the most popular programs are, what they provide, what families they serve, and then we'll talk about the basic basket.
Government Programs.
Bolsa Família, as we have already said, is the best-known program, and was created to provide an extra income for low-income families, based on the children's school attendance. If they miss school or are late for vaccinations, the benefit may be suspended or canceled.
Emergency Aid was provided at the time of the coronavirus epidemic and helped the unemployed and single mothers who had no other source of income.
The BPC (Continuous Benefit Payment) is aimed at poor people who have mental or physical disabilities or who are no longer able to work and are not yet of retirement age.
Child Labor Eradication Program, aimed at families with children and adolescents up to 16 years old who worked to help with the family income.
Harvest Guarantee: amount paid to rural workers and farmers who lost their crops due to rain, drought or dry spells (natural reasons).
Closed season insurance: artisanal fishermen receive this benefit when fishing is prohibited, more precisely during the fish reproduction season, or in the case of prevention of some species.
You can consult these programs of the government on the Transparency Portal, and have access to more details about each of them and receive news about when more government aid will be released. Also check in detail what the requirements are for you to receive them. Just type “Government Benefits Transparency Portal” into Google.
Basic Food Basket.
The basic food basket consists of 13 items that are considered essential for Brazilians to consume. The quantity and variety may vary according to the culture of each location.
The entity that assesses the value of products is Dieese (Inter-Union Department of Statistics and Socioeconomic Studies), which carries out the survey every month and collects the data to study the subject.
In the basic basket, we find rice, beans, coffee, sugar, flour, oil, potatoes, milk, bananas, meat, tomatoes, butter... but there are many other items that are consumed daily that are not on this list.
Values of the Basic Food Basket in the Country.
The fact is that inflation has also affected the basic food basket. According to Dieese, items have gone up across the country and this was seen in 16 of the 17 capitals. Florianópolis had the highest price recorded, with the basic food basket costing R$1,400.69.
Even with the increase in inflation over all these years, the basic food basket never reached this value, and this only shows how large the increase was and how something urgent must be done by the government.
Despite all this data, there is still no date for a possible launch of a program to help those in need, that is, a program to distribute free basic food baskets to the population.
Some companies, entities, and NGOs have this initiative and distribute food baskets to needy families, but there is still no government or official program.
Basic Food Basket Assistance During the Pandemic.
During the pandemic, some states took the initiative to create a basic food basket assistance program, where some families that were registered with CadÚnico received assistance through a food card.
This food card could only be used directly in supermarkets in the state to purchase fruit, food, vegetables and legumes, and the families receiving the card had to prove social vulnerability, according to the Single Registry.
In the State of Rio de Janeiro, the amount of R$$ 500.00 was paid to families with children enrolled in the municipal network and in Belo Horizonte (MG) the city hall distributed 57 thousand hygiene kits and 240 thousand basic food baskets.
Nowadays, there are some sporadic programs from city and state governments that run one campaign or another to provide basic food baskets to needy families in situations of extreme vulnerability.
But that is not enough, it is necessary to have a direct program from the federal government, like the others that already exist that we mentioned here at the beginning of this article, that is easily accessible through an application and that families can request assistance.
The actions carried out during the pandemic should continue since many families are still in a vulnerable situation, many people remain unemployed or have not been able to find a job that provides the income they had before.
