Press briefing of Cabinet Decision taken on 2019-03-06

Introducing an Alternative Care Policy for Children in Sri Lanka

- Alternative care methods such as retaining the children at risk of leaving their families due to various problems within their natural family itself by supporting such families, handing over the children leaving from their families into the custody of a relative, keeping them under the protection of a suitable person, giving for adoption and institutionalizing of children are being implemented within Sri Lanka, at present.
Therefore, in order to introduce the Alternative Care Policy for the effective implementation of the said Alternative Care methods, the proposal made by Hon.(Mrs.) Chandrani Bandara, Minister of Women & Child Affairs and Dry Zone Development on the Policy prepared focusing the major aspects, such as reasons for providing alternative care for children, identification of risk prone children, identification of appropriate alternative care systems in Sri Lanka, legal background of alternative care referral, identification of techniques to prevent children from institutionalization, identification of service providers for children, measures to be taken for the children brought before law, social integration of children and implementation of alternative care policies, was approved by the Cabinet.