Understanding Food Law in Chile: Key Regulations and Rights
Food Law
Chilean law • A. • The Civil Code arts. 321 and 337 of Title XVIII of Book I regulate essentially the following subjects:
- 1. Who and under what circumstances should food (art. 321)
- 2. How to proceed when you have multiple titles to request food (art. 326)
- 3. Grounds for disqualification from food (art. 324)
- 4. Criteria to assess food (articles 329, 330, and 333)
- 5. When and to whom to provide food (art. 327, 331, and 332)
The other provisions of the Civil Code relating to food are:
- 1. The relationship between divorce and the right to food (art. 174, 175, and 177)
- 2. Contribution of husband and wife in the common family expenses (art. 134)
- 3. Effect on the right to food that follows from judicial determination of paternity against the opposition of the father or mother (art. 203)
- 4. Nexus of judicial claim of affiliation and the possibility of enacting provisional maintenance (art. 209)
- 5. The food of a child abandoned by his parents (art. 240)
- 6. The obligation to pay maintenance and grandparents (section 232)
- 7. The obligation to pay maintenance and its determination by the judge (art. 233)
B. Juvenile Law • Law 16,618 of 8 March 1967 and its amendments. Juvenile law contains substantive and procedural rules regarding the right to food which corresponds to minors, i.e., persons under 18 years. This law is unique in referring to a special situation, that is, food that is lower in social risk or has been abandoned. The two main topics covered are:
- 1. The jurisdiction of juvenile courts in foodstuffs (art. 26)
- 2. The relationship between food and care establishments for a minor
The Law of Abandonment of Family and Alimony:
- 1. Determination of the amount of child support (art. 3 and art. 7)
- 2. Temporary food (art. 5)
- 3. Transaction on future food (art. 11)
- 4. Retention as payment (art. 8 and art. 13)
- 5. Allocation of maintenance to other services provided by the alimentante (art. 9)
• 6. Guarantees to ensure payment of child support (art. 10)
• 7. Failure to provide food. Penalties (Article 14, 15, and 19)
• 8. Solidarity in the payment of the maintenance obligation (art. 18)
• 9. The application of the rules on food law contained in this Act, to foods that are required as a preliminary issue in court on domestic violence, claims of parenthood, separation of property, divorce, and in general, any other procedure in which the law contemplates the possibility of decrees (art. 20).
Bankruptcy Law • D. Bankruptcy Law – Law 18,175 of October 28, 1982 – recognizes the right of the bankrupt and his family to creditors that the mass of food given in art. 60.
E. The right to food and the adoption law in relation to food law in art. 19,620. 37 is concerned with the effects of adoption and states that it “gives the adopted child’s marital status of the adoptive parents with all the reciprocal rights and duties” and we know that one of these effects is precisely the right to food.
Those who are qualified as adoptive parents and adopted under the 7613 Act or the rules of simple adoption 18,703 provided for by law, remain subject to the effects of the adoption under the respective provisions.
The Maintenance Obligation
A. The concept of maintenance obligation and food itself has been understood as the “maintenance obligation”—the legal duty of a person (alimentante) to provide food to another (food) under the provision of the law or the will of man.
Food enables the recipient to survive modestly in a way appropriate to their social position, which includes the money and resources needed for sustenance, clothing, health, housing, recreation, and primary and secondary education of the recipient, as well as learning a profession or trade.
B. Classification of food:
- 1. According to the source of the obligation: They may be legal or voluntary.