Kazakhstan without Orphans

The Kazakhstan without Orphans Project is held within the framework of activities of the Almaty Charity Foundations Association and is a joint project of such charity foundations as Dara, Ayala, and Mercy Home.

The Project aims to eradicate orphanage in Kazakhstan. Many Almaty Foundations in the course of their activities faced the fact that despite all the efforts of the state sector, NGOs, and private sponsors, many orphan school leavers remain to be misfits outside orphan homes. A percentage of suicides, vagrancy, being at places of detention, drug and alcohol addiction, and further entry of their children to orphan homes is high among leavers.
Having joined we decided that it is necessary to continue working on assimilation of existing orphans into the society, but it is more important to start working on decrease in their quantity. As is estimated today 46,000 orphans and children without parent care live in Kazakhstan. 35,000 of them are children whose parents are alive. Under data as of January 1, 2009 1, 439 orphans live in Almaty and 1,047 of them are social orphans. These are large figures for the country that did not have the historical phenomena of orphanage.
Holding meeting of the Charity Foundations Association, the Foundations concluded that orphanage and its anti-social consequences can be eradicated through promotion of ideas of successful adoption, guardianship, and patronage. Thus, it was decided to work in the following directions:

1)      Promote a positive change in public opinion about adoption, guardianship, and patronage;

2)      Promote a change of laws basis to incresse successful adoption, guardianship, and patronage.