Hope and Homes for Children Nepal
Background
In Nepal, there are currently 11,350 children growing up in residential care in 489 registered Child Care Homes (CCHs) across the country, but there is a strong momentum for care reform and deinstitutionalisation (DI) with interest and commitment from the Government.
Since 2019, HHC has been implementing a pilot project in Nepal in collaboration with local partners Forget Me Not and The Himalayan Innovative Society. During this time, they have made significant progress building political will, momentum and know-how for care reform and have facilitated the reintegration of 193 children with their families or in kinship care, supported with the closure of institutions, and made progress on the gatekeeping provision.
Project Plan
The project will partner with two municipalities in Chitwan District to establish pilots of foster care based on legal frameworks and the child protection needs of each area. One area (Madi Municipality) is semi-urban, and the other is more rural (Ichchhakamana Rural Municipality) so the project will be able to consider the different approaches that may be required in such contexts.
Through this project, we intend to demonstrate that foster care can be a part of the solution to keep children in families instead of institutions. The models developed through the project, and the process through which they are created, will be documented and assessed to inform scale-up and replication in other areas of the country.