International adoptions continue to plummet, with just 171 minors adopted in 2021 (latest available data provided by the Ministry of Social Rights), while domestic adoptions have increased by 25% from 2020 to 2021 to reach 675, which it means 846 adoptions in total. Two paths to motherhood and fatherhood that have one thing in common: the long and confusing procedure that can take between two and eight years, depending on the circumstances of the process (in international adoptions and in national adoptions of children under 3 years, the process takes longer. In older children's nationals it takes considerably less).
In the first case, it is explained because "it is necessary to apply and coordinate the legislation of two different countries, the one of the child's origin and the residence of the potential adopters, which can regulate and, in fact, often regulate, in a different way some of the issues related to adoption", point out from the Community of Madrid.
In national adoption, the delay is justified because in the public child protection system "not many cases of adoption occur, as support measures for vulnerable families or temporary or permanent fostering measures are preferred that do not extinguish the relationship between the boys and girls and their families of origin", indicate the same sources.
In both cases, the objective is to offer a family to a helpless minor always taking into account their interest, a completely different objective from other techniques to be fathers or mothers such as the now referred to surrogacy following the Ana Obregón case, linked to the regulations on assisted reproduction in which the purpose is to have a future baby. And, for this reason, adopters are required to be over 25 years old. If it is a couple, the fact that one of them has reached the mentioned age will suffice. The age difference between the adopter and the adopted will be at least 16 years and at most 45).
Adoption, as well as fostering (preliminary phase in many cases to adopt), follows a more complex path with numerous ups and downs. This is the case of international adoption, which boomed in the early years of the 20th century, with almost 5,500 children adopted in a single year. But now they barely reach 171 (2021).
The cause must be found in the decision of most countries (especially China) to avoid international adoptions as much as possible in the interest of national ones. They want the children to stay in their environment, in their country, explains Social Rights.
At the moment, the country where more children are adopted is India, followed by Vietnam and Bulgaria, with a big difference in terms of the rest. The case of China stands out, with a progressive drop that was reflected in 2020, with 6 adoptions and none in 2021, "due to the country's refusal to allow families with children assigned to travel to complete their processes of adoption", points out the latest Children's Observatory report, from the Ministry of Social Services. "The efforts made by the Spanish institutions involved in these processes with a tendency towards an opening of the country have not produced the expected results", explains the aforementioned report. Faced with this situation, the General Directorate of Children and Adolescent Rights issued a resolution on January 27, 2022 suspending the processing of new international adoption offers in China.
Regarding the profile of adopted children, the majority are children under the age of 3 (76 children), followed by those aged between 4 and 6 (47) and between 7 and 10 (43).
The communities where the most requests are registered are Madrid and Catalonia, followed by Galicia and Andalusia. And those that received the most boys and girls continue to be Madrid and Catalonia with 50 and 33, respectively.
National adoption remains more or less stable, although in 2021 there was a 25% increase compared to the previous period and reached 675 minors. Of course, the offers to adopt have also increased, up to 1,659.
But what has grown by far the most in percentage terms are the adoptions of children with disabilities, which have gone from 13 in 2020 to 62 a year later.
Regarding the ages of the children adopted in Spain, 349 were between 0 and 3 years old, 136 were between 4 and 6 and 123 were between 7 and 10 years old. 67 had more than eleven.
Once an adoptive family has been selected by the children's department of each community, a pre-adoptive family fostering is generally formalized. This measure implies that the minor begins living with his new family as soon as possible, avoiding periods of institutionalization. And, in a period that usually does not exceed a year, the adoption is formalized.
In Spain, in 2021 there were 16,177 children and adolescents in a situation of helplessness living in juvenile centers, of which 503 are between 0 and 3 years old and 536, between 4 and 6 (the law establishes maximum priority for these children). 60% are Spanish and a thousand have some kind of disability.
A total of 18,455 other children are in foster care, either from their own family or from other families. And many in permanent foster care by court decision (11,637), and 1,843 in the so-called "delegation of guardianship with the purpose of adoption". 90% are Spanish.
