Abstract

In Brazil, Community Restaurants (CRs) are regarded as an essential public initiative to expand food access for groups experiencing severe social vulnerability. This cross-sectional study analyzed the strategic effect of CRs as an indirect mechanism to ensure food availability in municipalities with more than 100,000 inhabitants, located in the North and Northeast regions of the country, using the CR evaluation matrix system of structural and process indicators as proxies to classify units as “not very effective,” “effective,” or “very effective,” rather than direct outcome impacts. Of the 94 CRs assessed (North: n = 23; Northeast: n = 71), most were rated as effective or very effective (95.6% in the North, 95.8% in the Northeast), with only one CR in Pará and three in the northeast (two in Bahia and one in Sergipe) classified as not very effective. The North region showed strong performance in financial resources, monitoring, location, physical structure, menu planning, incorporation of regional foods, volume of meals served to the attending public, and intersectoral actions. The Northeast excelled in financial resources, food security, physical structure, menu planning, and integration of regional foods, though it scored lower in education and volume of meals served to the attending public. This study represents the first structured application of the Oliveira matrix in the North and Northeast, providing new evidence on regional disparities and management challenges. These findings underscore CR’s strategic effectiveness in supporting regional efforts to improve food access and mitigate food and nutritional insecurity in historically vulnerable regions. However, outcome indicators such as dietary diversity, nutritional adequacy, and user health outcomes were not assessed. Future studies should incorporate these measures, alongside longitudinal designs and onsite evaluations, to better understand the broader impact of CRs on food and nutrition security.

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