Intercountry adoption

General information and statistics on intercountry adoptions

Although there are many children in England who are looking for an adoptive family, there are also children in other countries who need homes. Intercountry adoption may be their only opportunity to have a permanent family. For humanitarian reasons the Government allows intercountry adoptions to proceed where:

The child cannot be cared for in any suitable manner in his or her own country;
The adoption would be in the best interests of the child and with respect for his or her fundamental rights as recognised in international law; and
The adopter has been assessed as eligible and suitable to adopt from overseas by an adoption agency.

For more detailed information on the intercountry adoption process, please click here . Please also see our Frequently Asked Questions page.

For information on different countries requirements, click here

For contact details for local authorities, please click here

British citizens living abroad may be able to adopt a child according to the laws of that country. For more information, please click here

Adoptions made in countries outside the UK can now be registered in the Adopted Children Register. For more information, please click here

APPLICATIONS RECEIVED BY THE INTERCOUNTRY ADOPTION CASEWORK TEAM
In response to several requests for information on the number of applications for intercountry adoptions, a table showing data from 2002 to 2007 is available in this PDF to download (132kb). These figures will be updated on a quarterly basis. Please note that figures for 'under 5' are not shown for Data Protection reasons.

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