Ethiopian adoption is still reeling from all of the fraud and issues that it had this year. In the beginning of 2011, I posted that Ethiopia was the country to watch. Their adoption program was on fire. They were processing cases quickly. In retrospect, I should have more sensitive to the adoption process and realized that when a country is gaining ground so quickly but lacks the regulation to sustain it- a fall will occur. That is what happened in Ethiopia this year.
That might seem like a negative take on all that occurred. It actually is not. Ethiopia is now painfully aware of what must be done to protect its children. That is a good thing. The children are the reason that all of us are involved in adoption.
Ethiopia is beginning to rebuild small parts of its adoption program. It is working to re-align most of its statutes and develop a working, safe plan for the care and adoption of its orphan children. This may take some time and has definitely resulted in a slowdown in the placement of children. For those of you who are in the process, I know that they have cut their case completion down to 5 a business day. This is a major drop from the past and can add many months (in some cases, years) to your process. Some people argue that this slowdown will not add to the completion time. That is simply not true. There is no way that a 90% caseload drop will not cause a shift. It is not possible.
Another issue that Ethiopia faced this year that also slowed their case completion was the large number of incomplete I-600s that were filed in Addis Abba. Every one of those documents had to be hand-checked and validated. This was a long process that resulted in some adoptions being placed on hold. There have been many meeting with US stakeholders and Ethiopian Legislation to get to the bottom of this issue. I am not certain that resolution has been accomplished.
Am I saying that prospective parents should not seek adoption from this country? Of course not. There are many beautiful children who need the love of a forever family in this country. They have experienced poverty, hunger and disease. They deserve to be adopted. I do caution you though that the timeframe for adoption from this area is lengthened. I am not certain a timeframe can even be given at this point. If you are adopting from this country, hang in there. It will be worth the wait.
~Angie
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