When we applied to adopt, I didn’t understand the statistics. Sure, I read them, but actually understanding what they meant in real life, how the numbers affected individual cases and the children, not really. In 1999, there were 42 adoptions from Ethiopia. In 2010, there were 2,511 adoptions processed (Statistic and other info about Ethiopian adoption, check out this link: US Department of State). I didn’t comprehend what these numbers meant and how they affect the system. The huge increase in adoptions made ensuring that all adoptions are processed ethically much more difficult, especially for a government with limited resources. For those of you starting out with the adoption process, I wanted to give you a break down of changes in the process to help give you a picture of why the wait-times have increased. Waiting isn’t always bad :)
In the early days of international adoption in Ethiopia, your agency was allowed to appear in Ethiopian court on your behalf. Meaning you were legally declared a child’s parent before meeting them. That has changed and here’s why…There were cases where, after meeting the child, adoptive (and already legal) parents decided not to bring the child home. They got scared, changed their mind, who knows. Adoptions in Ethiopia are irreversible, so those children were legally adopted, but with no family to care for them. The point is, the government was forced to add the second trip, in the hopes that children would not be left stranded and un-adoptable.
Rules are broken, so privileges are taken away or regulations become more stringent. In Ethiopian adoption, there were agencies pushing cases that were not by-the-books and adoptive parents not following through, leaving their legally adopted children stuck un-adoptable and without parents. Bending rules and breaking promises lead to more regulations and a slower process. Right now we are in the thick on the consequences of the brokenness and the repair. For all of the children in Ethiopia who truly need family, I pray that there will be restoration.
Agencies have continued to give “soft referrals” of children whose paperwork has not been verified. Parents lose referrals, request for further evidence are required, cases are even denied. As these cases wave red flags at the Ethiopia government or the US Embassy, changes in the process are necessary. Below is a rough breakdown of the changes in the Ethiopian adoption process over the last 2-3 years.
TIMELINE OF THE CHANGES IN ETHIOPIAN ADOPTIONS
-Families start to adopt from Ethiopia in small numbers per year.
-Ethiopia grows in popularity as a country to adopt from because of a relatively quick and inexpensive process.
-The number of families wanting to adopt from Ethiopia becomes overwhelming to the government
-More and more cases wave red flags to the Ethiopian court. Agencies are pushing questionable cases through. Parents are leaving children in Ethiopia. There is talk of corruption.
-The Ethiopian government begins to change requirements and policies in an attempt to keep international adoption open, but cut down on unethical practices and safe guard the children and birth families.
-The requirement of a second trip is added (Middle of 2010)
-The adoption process as a whole slows down in Ethiopia and the wait list for children (specifically young, healthy children) grows and grows.
-In March of 2011, the Department of State reported that Ethiopia’s Ministry of Women, Children, and Youth Affairs announced that it intended to decrease its processing rate from approximately 50 cases per day to five cases per day. rate from approximately 50 cases per day to five cases per day, effective March 10, 2011. While Ethiopia did slow down processing for a number of months after the announcement, USCIS understands that Ethiopia has since resumed a rate of adoption case processing similar to before the slow-down. (info from: HERE)
-Also in 2011, a few agencies are put under investigation and cannot process adoption during this time. The Ethiopian government revoked the licenses and closed several orphanages in the Southern Nations State. Further slowing the process.
-Several agencies stop accepting applications for young healthy children because their wait list has become extremely long and the adoption climate in Ethiopia is unsure.
-Towards the end of 2011, a significant number of cases that were deemed not “clearly approvable” are sent to the US Embassy in Nairobi. A statement from the US Embassy about that HERE: “In addition, the Embassy continues to see cases which involve abandoned children but do not include sufficient evidence to document the abandonment and/or evidence of appropriate efforts to locate a child’s birth family. The Embassy also has received evidence of unethical recruitment of children from birth relatives and cases involving known birth parents from whom parental rights have not been severed by the Ethiopian courts.”
-Agencies with less than stellar ethics, keep pushing on. They boast short wait times and young children. Parents caught in long lines, stop and take notice. When things were moving smoothly, the unethical agencies had a shorter wait time, but not much. As the wait time for the more ethical agencies lengthen, the agencies willing to cut corners stand.
-Most recently, the court process has been changed to require an approval letter from MOWCYA (Ministry of Women, Youth and Children Affairs) before giving the adoptive family a court date. When agencies do not do the proper paperwork/investigation of a case, their cases do not always receive this approval letter. Requiring the letter before court, will ensure that families who travel to Ethiopia will have MOWCYA’s approval before meeting their child. This will add a bit of time to the wait for the court date, but is a good step toward better ethics in the process.
-The Ethiopian government and the US Embassy, with stronger regulations, will continue to notice some of the cases without proper verification of orphan status. In the last couple of weeks, several agencies have closed their programs in Ethiopia. Hopefully this is a sign that unethical practices will not be tolerated. The government is working on re-licensing agencies now.
What do all these changes mean? Adoptive parents must be cautious and vigilant in defending the cause of the fatherless. Most importantly, we must be patient. Hopefully, all of these changes will result in a more ethical and streamlined process, but it will take time. Choosing who you trust is so important. For more on choosing an agency, check out this post.
-Jenn
FOR MORE INFORMATION:
From: www.AdoptionInstitute.org
REPORTS OF ABUSES LEAD TO CHANGES IN ETHIOPIA’S ADOPTION PROCESS
“Recent reports of fraud and corruption have caused concern about adoptions from Ethiopia among child welfare organizations and the U.S. State Department, reports Peter Heinlein in a December 14 VOANews.com article titled “Under Pressure, Ethiopia Plans Crackdown on Baby Business.” Earlier in the month, the State Department issued a statement cautioning prospective adoptive parents against “malfeasance and abuse” and announcing delays in the adoption process in an attempt to ensure that all adoptions are ethical and in the best interests of the child. Ethiopian officials report that they will close orphanages that only serve as “transit homes” en route to adoption, and re-accredit all foreign adoption agencies in an effort to impose higher ethical standards. To read the article, go to: http://bit.ly/eWXZWi. To read the State Department notice, go to http://bit.ly/bqj5wI and scroll down to December 6, 2010.”
From: www.voanews.com
“The rapid rise in Ethiopian adoptions has set off alarm bells among children’s lobby groups. The U.S. State Department issued a statement this month expressing concern about reports of adoption-related fraud, malfeasance and abuse in Ethiopia.”
From: Adoption.State.Gov
“Similarly, while it is important to be able to acquire the necessary documentation in any given adoption, it is more important to know how the orphanage comes by this information and how it operates on a daily basis. If an ASP contributes funds to an orphanage or relies on an affiliate to operate an orphanage on its behalf, the ASP needs to know where that money goes and ensure that it benefits the children. Moreover, ASPs need to ensure that the documentation about a child presented by an orphanage is a reflection of the true circumstances and not simply a document created to satisfy a request.”
From: MelissaFayGreene.com
“Perhaps because Ethiopia scaled up too quickly, corrupt middlemen entered the scene faster than the Ethiopian government officials were able to ward them off. This has happened previously in Romania, Guatemala, Cambodia, Nepal, Viet Nam, Ukraine — in most countries, really, where tens of thousands of dollars cross international borders in search of healthy babies, especially in search of healthy baby girls. In Ethiopia, the good intentions of many were tarnished by the greed of a few. Hearts were broken, lives were damaged: birth-parents unwittingly gave up their children forever, or adoptive parents fell in love with children not legally free for adoption. Records were falsified; ages were changed; health prospects were fictionalized; living birth-parents were portrayed as deceased; 11-year-olds were presented as 7-year-olds; young children were coached by their elders to lie, in order to facilitate unethical adoptions.”
From: TheAtlantic.com
“Ethiopia’s federal government is working to address problems in the country’s adoption system. But the adoption industry has become so lucrative and so strong, especially in rural parts of the country, that many people who’ve raised questions about the process say they’ve faced intimidation and harassment from the industry.”
Amy Y. - Jenn,
I deeply appreciate your honesty in exposing the full complexity of adoption. Often, when I tackle yet another chore / document, I am flooded with grief and anger – over my loss, over my future son’s loss, over my frustration with the process to become a family. Your comments in this post have helped to “normalize” the situation, and have allowed me to give myself “permission” to feel whatever I am feeling without judgement. I found these comments especially profound and helpful: “I think I am grieving for her now, so that in the future I will be better prepared to grieve with her” and “As you are waiting, prepare your heart for the complexity of it all. Don’t put too much pressure on yourself or you family to feel any one way or another. Expect to feel a range of emotions both at the time of your referral and when you meet your child.”
Amber - Exactly what I’ve been feeling since we announced our plans to adopt. On one hand I’m so excited for this addition to our family, but on the other hand I wish there were no orphans, that every child could live happily ever after with their birth parents. But that’s not the reality of the world we live in. We may never understand the pain and sorrow of this world, but it’s all in God’s plan.
Tammia - Thank you for sharing this truth about adoption. A friend sent me this link and I appreciate your words & heart. I have to say I was most unprepared for the grief: both my daughter’s and my own. Amen to everything you said.
Shelly Shaw - Thank you for this Jenn, I often struggle (even now, pre-refferal) of the comments I get from people who say. “Oh that child is so lucky/blessed to have you two”. I often think that although the child is indeed truly blessed and loved by God it is through very tough and extremely hard circumstances that this child will come to be “ours”. I cant help but think this child’s life is a picture of the brokenness of sin in our world but their story of redemption is a beautiful picture of the gospel and redemption we have in Christ Jesus. Thanks for your post and helping my husband and I think through this even more and continue to look to and contemplate the sweetness of our Savior! Ephesians 1:5 “In love He predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved.”
Megan - I read another blog that shared really deeply about this…I can’t remember what blog it was, and I wish I could! Until I had read that blog post, it hadn’t really crossed my mind , and I’m really grateful for people’s honesty talking about it for those of us who are waiting. We pray so hard for our future daughter’s mother and family, and hurt deeply for what they will go through in the next few years. We don’t know that story, but God does. Like you’ve said in another post, I think, one thing that we pray is that if she doesn’t know the Good News, that God would send someone into her life to tell her, and that she would accept it and love Jesus. We want so badly to hug her in Heaven someday and tell her we took good care of her baby.
Cathy - I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately. My daughter and son-in-law will soon bring home two precious children who are actually in relatively good situations, considering what it could be. And yet my heart breaks for the grieving they will have to go through to become part of our family. They have no idea that their world is about the change dramatically. They have no way of knowing how long we’ve all waited and how much we’ve loved them from afar. Our love may eventually sooth their sorrow but will never completely cover the scars of their beginnings. I pray we’ll always know how best to walk along side of them in their journey.
Anna - Thank you so much for this post. In the two plus years we have been waiting I have already felt so many mixed emotions. I can’t imagine how many more will come with referral. Praying that God would begin to prepare our hearts now.
andrea - Thank you for this!
We were so surprised that we didn’t much feel like celebrating when we finally got the call… I barely slept at all that night. There’s alot of sadness and the truth is that there’s no easy story that results in adoption. I have been amazed ever since our referral at how happy folks seem to be about their referrals and I was beginning to think that maybe ours was the only sad story or that we were somehow wrong to feel conflicted.