GEORGIA: New plan to stop child abandonment

World Vision this month reached agreement with the government of Georgia, Unicef and EveryChild to implement new initiatives to stop child abandonment and free children from institutions.

The project will draw upon experience in other ex-Soviet bloc countries, such as Romania, where a similar project implemented by World Vision has proved successful.

Parties to the deal agreed the impersonal and inefficient state-run services fell far short of the United Nation’s Convention on the Rights of the Child, which Georgia signed in 1994.

The project will utilise existing social work services to:

• Establish a mother and infant shelter to act as a counselling and employment centre to prevent abandonment
• De-institutionalise infants and return them to their families where safe and appropriate
• Provide alternatives to institutional care, such as fostering and adoption

World Vision Georgia communications officer Rebecca Lyman said the coalition is determined, well equipped and compassionate.

“It’s common aim is to bring about social services to contribute significantly to resolving infant abandonment in Georgia and promote family-based care instead of institutionalisation,” she said.