Adoption Alert: Uganda’s Residency and Fostering Requirement

Uganda

February 2, 2017

Adoption Alert: Uganda’s Residency and Fostering Requirement

As reported in our June 2016 Adoption Notice, the Children Act Amendments of 2016 require non-Ugandan prospective adoptive parents to spend one year living in Uganda fostering the child(ren) they intend to adopt. It has come to the attention of the Department of State that in an effort to fulfill that requirement, some adoption service providers (ASPs) may be arranging for Ugandan residents to foster children on behalf of U.S. prospective adoptive parents. We urge prospective adoptive parents to carefully consider the following information before considering using “proxy fostering.”

Officials from Uganda’s Ministry of Gender, Labour, and Social Development (MGLSD), which has authority over Uganda’s adoption process, have told the State Department they are still in the process of drafting regulations to define how the Children Act amendments will be implemented. Therefore, there is limited information available about Uganda’s adoption requirements, and no assurance that the Ugandan government will accept proxy fostering as a way to fulfill the one-year residence and fostering requirement for adoption. Moreover, the MGLSD has verbally informed Embassy Kampala that its current intention is for the regulations to require prospective adoptive parents to physically reside in Uganda and foster their adoptive children there for a period of 12 months.

If you have questions about this notice, please contact the Department of State’s Office of Children’s Issues via email at adoption@state.gov. Please continue to monitor our website for updates on adoptions in Uganda.

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