Lasse became panic-struck: Denmark's only adoption agency warns members about money shortages
Lasse became panic-struck: Denmark's only adoption agency warns members about money shortages
Falling interest in adopting means that the adoption process can become more expensive and longer.
Lasse Nyhus was both angry and sad when he read the mail from the country's only adoption agency, Danish International Adoption (private photo).
SALLY FRYDENLUND LARSEN
09 MAR. 2019 KL. 6.30| UPDATED 09 MAR. 2019 KL. 09:37
Fewer Danes want to adopt children than before.
And that means that the country's only adoption agency, Danish International Adoption (DIA), has now come into money problems.
The DIA has written in a letter sent by the agency to its members.
The declining interest means fewer revenue for DIA, and in the worst case, the organization even stands without public support from 2021.
One of the hopeful adopters who have received the letter from DIA is Lasse Nyhus.
- I was panicked, says the 32-year-old school teacher who started the adoption process three years ago with his girlfriend.
If we are to raise the fees to a level where the organization is sustainable, then it is not something that ordinary Danes can afford to pay for.
LARS ELLEGAARD, CHAIRMAN OF THE BOARD, DIA.
The organization must work
DIA expects to run with losses already this year.
The organization has, however, entered into an agreement with the Ministry of Social Affairs, which means that the estimated deficit is covered in both 2019 and 2020. Then, the fate of DIA - and the adopters - is uncertain.
The insecurity lasts until August 1, when a study group in the Danish National Board of Appeal presents its assessment of how the Danish adoption system must be built up in the future.
According to Pernille Rosenkrantz-Theil, Social Democrat for Social Democracy, the conclusion of the study is decisive for whether the DIA will receive support after 2020.
- It depends on whether the DIA has come to function as an organization. I and we as a political system need to see that they can actually figure out how to handle the cuttings, and to promise money before we have seen it, I think is a very bad idea, she says.
According to Pernille Rosenkrantz-Theil, however, there is no reason to take the sorrows in advance.
- There is no need to paint the hell on the wall, because I think it feels good.
DIA
DIA is an independent, self-governing institution that is accredited by the Ministry of Social Affairs. The DIA has been created through a merger in January 2015 by the two dissemination organizations AC Børnehjælp and DanAdopt.
They convey adoptions from Bulgaria, Burkina Faso, Colombia, the Philippines, India, China, Madagascar, South Africa, South Korea, Thailand, Taiwan, the Czech Republic and Vietnam.
Source: DIA.
Not just for the elite
At DIA, they fear that the crisis will lead them to put up the adoption fees to make the business run around. This tells Lars Ellegaard, Chairman of the Board of DIA.
- If we are to raise the fees to a level where the organization is sustainable, then it is not something that ordinary Danes can afford to pay for, and so there is no one who wants it to be. Adoption should not be for the elite.
According to Lars Ellegaard, it generally costs about 250,000-300,000 kroner to adopt.
If prices rise, Lasse Nyhus fears that he and his girlfriend cannot afford it. For an adoption is already a costly affair.
- As a teacher and with my girlfriend, who is a nurse, a price of DKK 250,000 to be allowed to adopt a child is a very large item in the household budget. So I get very nervous about whether we can afford to have the children we want, he says.
The Minister says:
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It is the Minister of Children and Social Affairs Mai Mercado (K) who is minister in the field. In a written reply to DR News, she writes:
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- It is important that Danish couples still have the opportunity to adopt from abroad. Therefore, I am pleased that with the set-money agreement, we give the organization an economic boost for the next two years, while we examine how we get a sustainable structure for international adoption.
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- At the same time, of course, we focus on those who are already in the adoption process, so they do not lose hope of becoming parents.
Emotional strain
In the letter to the adopters, DIA emphasizes that the organization cannot be held responsible for the loss of money shot by adopters in the adoption project if the DIA has to shut down before the parents stand with a child.
This with adopting is a very difficult situation and a very long process.
LASSE NYHUS, ADOPTER.
Nevertheless, it is not the money that is the worst for Lasse Nyhus. That is the uncertainty.
- This with adopting is a very difficult situation and a very long process, and I just looked at me that it became even harder, even longer and even more expensive. The immediate consequence is that we now have to go until August with a renewed unsafe feeling in the stomach - before then we do not know anything about how the future will look, he says.
And Lars Ellegaard understands well. But in order for a potential disruption of the adoption process not to come as a shock, the organization has chosen to play with open cards about the economic challenges.
"They should not stand in the situation where they thought they were otherwise quite sure that now they could have a child in the foreseeable future, and then saw the world suddenly different because of these circumstances," he says.
DIA writes on its website that it lacks families who are interested in adopting children from especially Korea and Taiwan.
The organization had 200 active cases by the end of 2018.
Updated with information on the number of active cases.