Dear Adoption Service Providers, 

A persistent obstacle to expanding opportunities for intercountry adoption is U.S. families sometimes do not submit the post-adoption reports they agreed to at the time their adoption was finalized. This causes countries of origin concern about the welfare and whereabouts of the adopted children and may jeopardize the continuation of intercountry adoption. In addition, some countries have conditioned the resumption of intercountry adoption on receipt of missing post-adoption reports. 

We call on all ASPs to join the Department of State in a day of action to help address this problem. We have designated May 15 as “Post-Adoption Report Day.” Please join us by reaching out to adoptive families through social media, listservs, and other communication avenues to urge submission of missing reports on that date. Check the country-specific pages on our website, http://adoptions.state.gov, for post-adoption reporting requirements and foreign government points of contact. The Office of Children’s Issues would like to hear about your success at Adoption@state.gov! 

ASPs should be aware that if there has been a secondary placement of an adopted child, countries of origin still expect to receive post-adoption reports and become concerned about the child’s welfare if those reports are not received. Please join us in encouraging all adoptive families to help address countries’ concerns. 

To read more about our efforts to address barriers to intercountry adoption, please see the Department’s FY2016 Annual Report to Congress. 

Sincerely,

The Office of Children’s Issues