Note: International Adoption Statistics for 2008 are found in a different blog.

Happy Day to everyone. I am doing my happy dance because the 2007 immigration numbers were posted by the Office of Immigration Statistics. Children internationally adopted by American families are included in these numbers. I love playing with numbers and statistics.

With these numbers, I can look at international adoption trends across 12 years. I can look at average age or gender of children adopted from a specific country. I will be doing several different blogs on adoption statistics, but first I will start with 2007.

This isn't a big surprise but 42% of the children were adopted from Asia. The children were adopted from:

• China, People's Republic
• Hong Kong
• India
• Iran
• Japan
• Korea
• Nepal
• Pakistan
• Philippines
• Taiwan
• Thailand
• Vietnam

27% of the children were adopted from North America. Immigration counted Central America and the Caribbean as part of North America. Families adopted from:

• Dominican Republic
• El Salvador
• Guatemala
• Haiti
• Honduras
• Jamaica
• Mexico

20% of the children were adopted from European countries. The children are from:

• Armenia
• Bulgaria
• Estonia
• Hungary
• Kazakhstan
• Kyrgyzstan
• Latvia
• Lithuania
• Moldova
• Poland
• Russia
• Ukraine
• Uzbekistan

9% of the children are from Africa. They come from:

• Cameroon
• Ethiopia
• Ghana
• Kenya
• Nigeria
• Sierra Leone
• Uganda
• Zambia
  

   

2% of the American families adopted from South America. The children were adopted from:

• Brazil
• Colombia
• Ecuador
• Guyana
• Peru

More of the adopted children were female then male. And the majority of children were 4 years or younger. 

If I exclude the China adoption numbers, then the statistics get close to equal on gender. 48% of the children are boys vs 52% girls. And even more interesting... It looks like people adopt children who are 1-4 years  from China. Look how the percentage of children 5 years or older grows without the China adoptions.

So next I just looked at which countries adopt the most children from each age category. 97% of the children who were 1 year or younger were only adopted from 10 countries.

93% of the children who were 1-4 years old were adopted from 15 different countries.

91% of the children who were 5 years or older were adopted from 20 different countries.

93% of the boys were adopted from 15 countries.

90% of the girls were adopted from 10 countries.

I understand a little bit better now why there has been more gender conversations on various email lists. The top 3 places to adopt young girls from are China, Guatemala and Russia. And all 3 of these countries have gotten harder to adopt from over the last few years. Either because of changes in rules or Guatemala's struggles with Hague implementation.

Related Links

• US State Department, Adoption Info Moves and International Adoption Statistics for 2008
• Adoption Statistics
• Foster Care Adoption Statistics
• International Adoption Trends Over 12 Years
• Massachusetts and US Adoption Trends
• Race and Foster Care
• Research International Adoption Statistics
• Surprising Statistics On Russian Domestic Adoptions
• Teen Pregnancy Statistics
• Ukraine Adoption Statistics
• Who Are The International Adopted Children?
• Who is Most Likely to Adopt?