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 | Guidelines for Adoption in China
Jean Nelson-Erichsen, LSW-MA, and Rebekah Waye |
To provide readers with a more in-depth coverage of the adoption process in China, Jean Nelson-Erichsen and Rebekah Waye of Los Ninos International Adoption Center have provided the following overview. Outlined are general guidelines for adopting from China.
December 2004
Chinese New Year took off with a swing in the Year of the Monkey. Thousands of families with children from China celebrated their happiness and good fortune. Thanks to the humanitarian efforts of the China Center of Adoption Affairs, or CCAA, more than 6,000 Chinese children find homes in America each year.
CCAA no longer maintains a quota system for the number of children that may be adopted each year. CCAA has opened new regions within China to adoption, and the waiting time for a referral was gradually reduced during the past few years. They have also launched a new program, the Tomorrow Program, to address the needs of China’s special needs children. However, agencies are still asked to limit the number of single applicants. Only 8 percent of the agency’s applicants may be unmarried. CCAA encourages agencies to work with applicants in their state of licensure in order to provide adequate support and post-adoption services to families.
CCAA considers certain cases urgent and gives priority to applicants who are ethnic Chinese born abroad or in the United States.
Prospective adoptive parents who are clients of agencies who signed special agreements with CCAA to place children older than 3-years-old and those with special needs are also given priority.
General Requirements
Singles and married couples who are childless or already have up to four children can adopt. Applicants must be between 30 and 44 years old to adopt babies around 1 year old. Applicants between 45 and 50 years old may adopt children between 1 and 3 years old. These rules also apply to single women. Married applicants aged 51 to 55 years old may adopt children 4 years of age or older. Single men must be at least 40 years old to adopt.
According to CCAA, the current wait for a referral from the time the translated dossier arrives at the center is about eight months. Upon the adoptive parent’s acceptance of the referral, an adoption date is set in one to two months and a group of adoptive parents travel to China to meet their children.
The group is met at a gateway city in China by a bilingual representative and brought to the orphanage or provincial capital for a week in order to meet the children, adopt and obtain passports.
The following week, the guide takes the group to Guangzhou to acquire photos and medical exams for the orphan visas. By the end of the week, the new families return home.
To those happy parents and babies, we wish them Gung Hey Fat Choy in the Year of the Monkey.
Jean Nelson-Erichsen, LSW-MA, is the director of social work and Rebekah Waye is the international caseworker for Los Ninos International Adoption Center. Nelson-Erichsen is the author of “How to Adopt Internationally,” which can be found at www.internationaladoption.ezhoster.com and “Butterflies in the Wind: The Truth About Latin American Adoptions,” which can be found at www.iUniverse.com. For more information, contact Los Ninos by calling (281) 363-2892, or (888) LOS-NINO, or visit www.losninos.org.
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