Page 2 of
2 The mystery of China's lost
girls By Kent Ewing
male children, and the practice of
determining the sex before birth through
ultrasound to produce a ratio of 117 boys per 100
girls under age five. In some regions, the ratio
is a high as 130:100. This compares with an
average 104-107:100 in industrialized countries.
So where have all the Chinese girls gone?
According to the National Bureau of
Statistics (NBS), China's
birth rate in 2005, the last
year measured, was 1.24%. That adds up to 16.17
million babies.
Consider, however, the
International Planned Parenthood Association's
estimate that there are about 7 million abortions
per year in China, 70% of which involve females.
If the NBS figures are right - and let's hope they
are not - that means the abortion rate in China is
nearly 30%. It would also mean the 5 million girls
aborted last year more than cover the 117:100
gender gap, but that also sounds suspect.
Writing in the New York Times this month,
author and adoptive mother Beth Nonte Russell
claimed there could be 60 million missing Chinese
girls by the end of the decade, 10 million more
than accounted for by abortion figures.
What's the truth? Where are all the lost
girls - dead or alive? Nobody really knows. But
Russell isn't the only adoptive parent who
suspects that a lot of them are wallowing in
orphanages.
Anyone who has spent time in
China's orphanages will tell you that they are
full of unwanted girls. Indeed, according to one
Hong Kong-based teacher who organizes an outreach
program to an orphanage in Guangdong province, any
child who is not a girl is likely to be physically
or mentally handicapped.
A senior social
worker in Guangdong who specializes in orphans and
special-needs education confirmed government
reports that domestic adoptions are rising while
the overseas rate decreases. Curiously, however,
she was unaware of the new rules for foreign
adoptions.
On the face of it, despite the
outrage in the US, the guidelines appear to be
supported by accepted international principles.
The Hague Convention on Intercountry Adoption,
signed by China and 69 other countries, states
that all "appropriate measures" should be taken to
find an adoptive family in a child's country of
origin. If that is not possible, the treaty calls
on signatories to ensure that foreign parents
provide "for the full and harmonious development"
of the child in a "family environment, in an
atmosphere of happiness, love and understanding".
China can argue that married couples are
better than single parents and that stable
marriages are best of all. In addition, parents
with financial security, good health and longevity
clearly enhance a child's future prospects.
But what if the supply-and-demand argument
is only a smokescreen to obscure a brutal
side-effect of the one-child policy, which was
reaffirmed last month through at least 2010 by the
minister for population and family planning, Zhang
Weiqing? The government claims the policy has held
the country's huge population in check and
promoted economic development by preventing 400
million births, but it has also led to millions of
abortions and created a perverse boy-girl ratio
that demographers translate into 40 million men
with no prospect of a partner by 2010.
Moreover, there may be millions of lost
girls who foreign parents - whether single,
overweight, over 50 or all three in one - say
would be better off with them than languishing in
a forgotten Chinese orphanage.
"Many of
the families I know [now] no longer qualify to
adopt," said one California parent who is part of
a group of 23 families in her area who have
adopted Chinese children. "One has been cancer-
free for five years, one is significantly
overweight, one had a minor arrest in college, but
the one thing they all have in common is that they
are amazing parents.
"China says [it is]
trying to improve the quality of families
adopting. I can understand that, but what I can't
understand is why they [Chinese officials] think
that a child would be better off in an orphanage.
They claim that there aren't enough babies
available and this is why the wait has grown, but
from what we hear in the US, there are an
estimated 2 million babies in orphanages in China.
Why are only 10,000 or so being adopted?"
That's a good question, and Beijing should
feel obliged to provide a clear answer to the
international community.
Kent
Ewing is a teacher and writer at Hong Kong
International School. He can be reached at
kewing@hkis.edu.hk.
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