The number of children from Africa being adopted by
foreign nationals from other continents has risen dramatically, a report has
said.
In the past eight years, international adoptions increased by
almost 400%, the African Child Policy Forum has found.
"Africa is becoming the new frontier for inter-country
adoption," the Addis Ababa-based group said.
But many African countries do not have adequate safeguards in
place to protect the children being adopted, it warns.
The majority of so-called orphans adopted from Africa have at
least one living parent and many children are trafficked or sold by their
parents, the child expert group says.
More than 41,000 African children have been adopted and taken
out of home countries since 2004, the ACPF report says.
More than two thirds of the total in 2009 and 2010 were adopted
from Ethiopia, which now sends more children abroad for adoption than any other
country, apart from China.
Adoptable children shortage
"Compromising children's best interests while undertaking
inter-country adoption is likely and adoption can become a vast, profit-driven,
industry with children as the commodity," the African Child Policy Forum report
said.
The group's director, David Mugawe, said that adoption in some
parts of Africa had indeed become a business.
"It's got an element where adoption has now become
commercialised. And so it's an industry that some orphanages are benefiting
[from] - and they are promoting adoption basically to be able to sustain and
maintain the orphanages," he told the BBC's Focus on Africa programme.
He said large sums of money were sometimes being paid by
prospective parents.
"There was a lady who worked with the American embassy in
Uganda and she mentioned the figures ranged between $10,000 to $30,000," Mr
Mugawe said.
According to the ACPF, Ethiopia has more than 70 adoption
agencies, including 15 that only refer children to families in the United
States.
Most African children go to the US, which is where most
adoptions from foreign countries occur - in 2010 more than 11,000 children from
more than 100 countries were adopted by American parents.
Families in western Europe and Canada also adopt African
children.
International adoption is also popular in Nigeria, the
Democratic Republic of Congo, South Africa, Mali, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Morocco,
Uganda, and Burkina Faso, the ACPF report says.
People wanting to adopt children are increasingly turning to
Africa because changes in adoption patterns and laws in other countries has
resulted in a shortage of adoptable children, it says.
Countries including China, South Korea, Guatemala, Russia,
Romania and Ukraine have tightened up eligibility rules and shut down or limited
overseas adoption - instead promoting domestic adoption.
According to international law, inter-country adoption should
be a last resort - and the rise in the number of children being adopted in
Africa and moved to other countries is of concern to child welfare experts.
"Every child has the right to be reared in the country and
culture in which it was born," said Mr Mugawe.
"It is true that a number of children have actually benefited
from adoption, but is it the best option or have other options been explored,"
he told the BBC.
The report warned that many countries on the continent do not
have strong enough laws and policies to stem illicit activities including child
trafficking.
Only 13 African countries have ratified the Hague Convention,
which provides various safeguards to try to ensure children are not adopted
illegally.
"The onus is on African states to take urgent and decisive
measures to strengthen families and communities to take care of children in
their country of origin," the ACPF report says.
