Analyse Du Jeu Des Acteurs Intervenant Dans La Gestion Des Cantines Scolaires, Dans Le Département De l’Atacora

Abstract

School feeding projects are social safety nets that promote the retention of children in school and their access to healthy food. These projects mobilize several types of actors who are distinguished by their relative importance, which generally determines their involvement. In the Atacora department, the actors involved in school canteen projects are not all as powerful as one another and do not have the same capacity to impose their priorities. The civil society organizations involved in the system are very sensitive actors with very little control power and are in a vulnerable position because of their high dependence and low influence in the system. Unfortunately, they cannot build the game, and therefore must adapt while remaining at risk of being pushed out of the game. However, the actors Teachers/School Directors, NGOs and Parent-Teacher Associations have a certain capacity to change the system by imposing themselves on their weaker counterparts, such as the cooks, the local producers' groups, the transporters/wholesalers of foodstuffs and the school canteen management committees. The analysis of the convergence between actors according to their relationship of power in the system led to the conclusion that the future of school feeding projects must be built around decentralized actors, because they are an important link in the management of these projects, and a failure in their commitment could have a lasting effect on the entire system.