POLITCS OF ADOPTION POLICIES IN NEPAL

Adoption in Nepal: Mythologized, Misunderstood and Mobilized

A Retrospective Study of Kathmandu Valley

by : CWISH and NEPAL SCHOOL OF SOCIAL WORK

Executive Summary

1.                Twenty years on from the adoption of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, children’s rights are still not seen as a serious political issue. Legal measures and government policy documents proclaim that best interests of children should be of paramount consideration while deciding about adoption in Nepal. Family-based community care; in-country adoption should be an option explored before any child is sent for intercountry adoption from Nepal. If and when possible, children should be given an opportunity to decide about their choices. In addition to these governmental efforts, there are many NGOs named as child care homes and orphanages in Nepal that are involved in facilitating adoptions especially intercountry adoptions. This research report documents and analyses domestic and intercountry adoption policy and practices in Nepal.

2.                The general objective of the study is to review the legal procedures and gaps regarding inter and intra country adoption procedures, study the status of child care homes in the Kathmandu Valley and to identify the people’s perspective on domestic and international child adoption. The specific objectives of were to understand the adoption practices by the government, child care homes and international child adoption agencies involved in Nepal, to analyze the views of various stakeholders regarding the efficacy of legal measures and services provided by Child Care Homes., o appraise the human resources and infrastructure (status of the) available at child care homes and to recommend policy intervention and strategies to address the issues of adoptions.

3.               The study used both qualitative and quantitative research tools and collected the perceptions of different stakeholders from the Kathmandu Valley. The study also analysed the status of the child care homes and found that more than 80 percent of the child care homes donot have adequate human and infrastructure facilities. The main findings and recommendations are: Though the current study is located within the Kathmandu valley the results will have implication for the Nepalese policy on both domestic and intercountry adoptions. 2. From the Public Perceptions study, it is clear that in Nepal a large majority of the general public are not fully aware of the intricacies of adoption policy and processes, hence leading to misconceptions about adoptions, especially with intercountry adoptions.3.Public perception suggests that laws and policies should be made transparent, and monitoring body is to be formed to ensure the safety of the child. The child should not be adopted until the prospective adoptive parents prove that they have sound economic condition or financial security and are committed to the child’s future and wellbeing. The child care homes that are involved with adoption services were not very open to share their work with others like researchers. They were not entirely transparent and worried about the future of the sector. The adoption policy is heavily contested by the different interest groups (The Hague Conference on Private International Law, Government bureaucrats, NGOs, INGOs, Law makers, Media, Embassies Child care homes, Academic and research institutes) in Nepal and hence the policy is an outcome of push and pulls factors.