Adoption is one option used to provide permanent care for children not able to live with their families. It is a process where full parental rights and responsibilities for a child are legally transferred from the child’s parents to their adoptive parents.
This page provides an overview of adoptions in Australia in 2018–19. It also covers types of adoption, historical trends in adoption and a focus on recent increases in adoptions by known carers, such as foster parents (AIHW 2019).
In 2018–19, 310 adoptions were finalised in Australia. Of these, 253 (82%) were domestic adoptions of children born or permanently living in Australia.
The two types of domestic adoption of Australian children are: known child adoption, where the child and adoptive parents know each other before adoption, and local adoption, where the child and adoptive parents do not know each other. Known child adoptions made up 68% of all adoptions finalised in 2018–19, while local adoptions represented 14% (Figure 1).
Australian adoptive parents can also adopt children from overseas. Adoptions of children from other countries are called intercountry adoptions. These children can legally be adopted but generally have had no previous contact or relationship with the adoptive parents. Intercountry adoptions accounted for 18% of all adoptions in Australia in 2018–19, with 96% of intercountry adoptees originating from Asian countries. The most common country of origin was South Korea (30%), followed by an equal proportion from both Taiwan and the Philippines (26%).
Generally, adoptions by relatives or other known carers of children from other countries, are termed ‘known child intercountry adoptions’. This type of adoption is outside the scope of national adoptions data. See glossary for definitions of adoption categories.