Country update !

While this wait is starting to feel really long and sometimes like we will never receive our refferal, it is always very exciting when we receive updates from our adoption program.

I will be listing in the next few posts a few things mentionned in the last update that we have received yesterday from our agency (October 23).

We always receive lots of questions on why it takes so long to have our dossier matched with our babies and why we have not heard anything yet, so by sharing this information, we hope that it will also answer some of your questions.

Here is the first part of the update:

1) Questions regarding programs differences in Ethiopia, referral times, etc.

Ethiopia has had programs from many countries placing children for adoption for over 15 years.
Each country has some unique features to how they do adoption work because of their
own laws and policies, or Immigration rules that are specific to the adoptive parents' country of residence.

While the office of the CYAO has never had huge numbers of staff to process the paperwork, they
have been astute to the needs of children, and issues of international adoption. The result of this
is that there are modifications to the process from time to time- but it remains substantially the same; in intent
now, as it was 15 years ago. CYAO hosts at least three workshop or in-service seminars to agency representatives,
orphanage directors, and others involved in the adoption process, a year. Haregewain was in attendance
at the most recent one this past week.

There is a misconception that adoption looks different with every agency- depending on who they know in Ethiopia,
what kinds of contacts they may have, and so on. I think that there has been confusion as a result , with many thinking
that every agency can forge their own pathway in working in adoption in Ethiopia. This is not so.

All agencies must follow the same rules, policies and laws in Ethiopia to achieve successful, legal adoption
placements. I confirmed this with Ato Haddush when I met with him last week in Addis. The unique differences
that may be causing the confusion could come from each country's specific issues from their own resident laws
that are not connected to Ethiopia's process.

Please also be aware that Ethiopia has the right to initiate their own policies, rules and regulations around
foreigners applications to adopt their children. As an agency, we must comply implicitly with these in order to continue
to work there. Since it is in the best interest of everyone- families and children - to be honest and true to
following Ethiopia's laws and regulations, we choose to work with individuals within our agency, and
on the ground in Ethiopia who will do the same.

All agencies can only place for adoption children who are legally available. For a child to be legally available
for adoption they must:
a) have been registered with their local civil bureau of social welfare,
b) have had documentation received by CYAO, and approved for processing for adoption
c) been assigned to an orphanage

Legally available children are those who:
are found abandoned,
who are known to be orphaned,
who have dying or aged relatives who relinquish the child to their local civil social affairs bureau to be adopted

It is illegal for a capable, healthy parent to place their child for adoption- such as we do in North America
with birth mothers relinquishing at birth, or locating an adoptive family, and giving up their child for
adoption at the time of birth. To quote a previous CYAO director " Poverty is not sufficient reason
to separate families"

CYAO delegates to licensed orphanages to arrange a match to an adoptive family and signing a contract of adoption
with an adoption agency representative. To complete an adoption, a director of CYAO, the orphanage director,
the agency representative (who represents the adoptive family), are all in court approving every child
match/adoption that is made- during the adoption court hearing.

There are now 60 agencies in Ethiopia. Those who have only begun this year are finding that they can give
referrals quickly to the first number of families ( maybe as many as 30 depending on the size of their foster homes
or orphanages) as they have been anticipating dossiers coming to them while waiting for the license to be granted.
Many have been taking children into their facility in the hopes they will have families to adopt them.
Some are even well enough organized to communicate with their agency on the ground abroad,
so that they know what the first families specifically wish to adopt.

However, all agencies are finding that after a time they reach a critical point where the number of applicants exceeds their
ability to plan in advance/house children for those coming on as new families, and they begin to have a "waiting list".
From what I can understand from Haregewain, Ato Haddush and being in the country, new agencies
are able to give proposals quickly at the moment, but know they will not be able to sustain this.

Overall, applications coming into Ethiopia regardless of the country, have high percentages of applicants wishing
to adopt an infant under 12 months of age, and particularly female infants. So while there are lots of children
ready and waiting for adoptive families, the largest activity of placements are occurring with infants.
This means that waiting for infants has become longer as the country has increased the number
of agencies, and the agencies have larger numbers of applicants wanting infants.

Those wishing to adopt children older than 3 years of age, or siblings up to 6 years of age, are still finding
that they have proposals in up to 6 months ( after the documentation arrives to Ethiopia)> Despite longer waits
for infant placements, families are still well within the total 18- 24 month time frame we give that it takes for an Ethiopian adoption.

CAFAC, like all agencies working in Ethiopia right now, has a waiting list of families looking for infants under 12 months,
and many female infant requests. The result over the past year is that the wait for our potential families has increased
for this specific type of proposal. The reasons for this is a combination of all agencies looking for the same types of
referrals as our families. There is no formula, pattern, foreknowledge or predictions that can be applied to understand
how long a proposal may be for any given family, or agency in the future. We continue to believe that
disclosure of the time frames for those who are now receiving proposals is the only measurement we know
is true. We also continue to believe that by doing this, we are being honest with our families in representating the program
as it is.

All families who apply through our agency will receive a child proposal, and have the agency complete the adoption
on their behalf. Regardless of the timing of a proposal, or how many agencies are working in Ethiopia, all applications
that remain in place will be processed and completed. This has been true for the past 15 years of this program, and will not
change in the future.