This country urgently needs strict guidelines to regulate adoption

In the recent weeks, the media has been awash with stories of children in need of alternative care. The common solution many people have pointed to has been adoption. Adoption is a very good initiative for children in need of alternative care, but this is possible only if the adopters have done it with good intentions.

A report by the Africa Child Policy Forum shows that adoption from Uganda to the United States rose from 62 children in 2010 to 207 children in 2011, with at least 95 per cent of these adoptions finalised in the United States. The same report adds that the issuance to foreign adopters of legal guardianship orders instead of final adoption papers could be used to circumvent proper adoption procedures in Uganda.

Most of the reasons given for adopting or gaining guardianship for children from Uganda are to improve the child’s welfare, while some parents see it as an avenue for having their children abroad, yet there is no mechanism of tracking their wellbeing once they leave the country.

Inter-country adoptions are partially attributed to poverty, child neglect and, of course, the financial gains that accrue from adoption procedures. According to the African Child Policy Forum, approximately $9,050 is charged as adoption fees, but often disguised as passport, humanitarian and administrative costs. It also appears that there are at least 28 adoption agencies in Uganda recruiting children to be adopted mostly by foreign families. There is no problem with this, of course, only that adequate government supervision of these adoption agencies is lacking.
 

The adoption industry in Uganda today is a multimillion-dollar industry. This is a huge incentive to many poverty- stricken families who see this as their passport to wealth. Adopting parents prefer Uganda because it is easier and faster to adopt a child here, but also because the adoptions are easily facilitated by profit oriented adoption agencies.

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