Ministry claims lack of resources; Disciplines such as History and Sciences are for future stages
The (Ministry of Education) decided to buy only Portuguese and Mathematics textbooks for the 2026 school year in elementary school, leaving out subjects such as history, geography and science.
In a note, the ministry justified the measure citing a “Challenging budget scenario” And reported that the purchase will be made staggered. The other works must be acquired later.
Books are purchased by FNDE (National Fund for Education Development) and distributed by PNLD (National Textbook Program). To serve the entire public network, about 24 million copies would be required. However, according to the president of (Brazilian Association of Books and Educational Contents), Ângelo Xavier, less than 15% of the expected total has been negotiated so far.
“The approved federal budget is $ 2.04 billion, while the actual need is estimated at $ 3 billion”, said Xavier to Poder360.
The decision should mainly affect students from 1st to 3rd year. They use consumable books where they exercise directly and take home at the end of the school year. Therefore, it is necessary to buy new copies every year.
For Xavier, the fragmentation of the purchase represents a “Unacceptable setback”, compromising equity in accessing the textbook and the right to learning.
“For schools, this means receiving incomplete materials, making pedagogical planning and continuity of teaching difficult ”these.
In addition to elementary school, MEC reported that purchases for EJA (Youth and Adult Education) are guaranteed, with final bidding. Already the strategies for the acquisition of high school books will be defined later, in the new stage of the planning.
Here’s the full MEC note:
“Considering the challenging budget scenario and the unequivocal importance of maintaining PNLD for Brazil’s public education, FNDE has adopted the staggered purchase as a strategy for elementary school, meeting a demand from teaching networks and in line with the evaluation of the program’s pedagogical teams, starting with the Portuguese language and mathematics areas, and later complementing works from other areas. End, they are guaranteed. Strategies for high school will be defined in the sequence. ”
