FNS Documents & Resources

The Food Buying Guide for child nutrition programs has all of the current information in one manual to help you and your purchasing agent buy the right amount of food and the appropriate type of food for your program(s), and determine the specific contribution each food makes toward the meal pattern requirements.

The Food Buying Guide for Child Nutrition Programs has current information to help you and your purchasing agent.

This memorandum provides guidance to state distributing agencies and recipient agencies on the use of market basket analysis in procuring processed end products for USDA Foods in Schools and commercial goods for the National School Lunch Program, School Breakfast Program, Summer Food Service Program, and Child and Adult Care Food Program. 

This rule proposes to revise and clarify requirements for the processing of donated foods in order to: Incorporate successful processing options tested in demonstration projects, ensure accountability for donated foods provided for processing, and increase program efficiency.

The purpose of this policy memorandum is to clarify the options available to state distributing agencies or recipient agencies in assigning value to USDA donated foods for audit purposes.

The Nutrition Standards in the National School Lunch and School Breakfast programs final rule was published on Jan. 26, 2012. The final rule requires that fruits and vegetables be offered as separate meal components in the National School Lunch and School Breakfast programs.

Effective Oct.1, 2008, institutions receiving funds through the child nutrition programs may apply an optional geographic preference in the procurement of unprocessed locally grown or locally raised agricultural products.

This rule proposes to revise and clarify requirements for the processing of donated foods, in order to incorporate processing options tested in demonstration projects, to more effectively ensure accountability for donated foods provided for processing, and to streamline current reporting and review requirements.

This memorandum provides instructions on how to reconcile the physical inventory conducted at a distributing agency- or subdistributing agency-level storage facility with the book inventory required to be maintained for that facility.