The research was conducted in several child care homes (CCH) based in Kathmandu, Bhaktapur, Lalitpur, Chitwan, Kavre, Makwanpur, Dhading, Rasuwa, Pokhara, Gorkha, and Surkhet.
According to the findings, there are many child care homes (CCH) that do not have proper documentation of where the children came from. Aryal says 10.4 percent of the care homes admitted to not having any filing system of the admitted children. But this data does have its limitations. According to Aryal, the researchers did not have the jurisdiction to ask for proof of documentation with the remaining 89.4 percent of the child care homes. He and his team suspect that a significant number of children's homes are operating without proper documentation. Furthermore, these institutes also lack proper staff to take care of children living there. “In one of the CCH, we had one person who cooked, cleaned, looked after the children, and is also running the institute,” says Aryal, ensuring no proper care for those children. Some of these orphanages were on the same building as a guest house, exposing many children to exploitation and sexual abuse. “They were also reluctant to let us visit,” he says. The findings also show that most of these institutions lack budget security, good food, and good health services. It does raise a question on how the government has been monitoring these institutions. Aryal says that there is a huge gap in communication between local, provincial and federal government which is why people running these institutions have gone unnoticed. “This lack of competence from the government exposes children to trafficking, sexual exploitations and pedophiles,” he adds. Also, the study says that most of these children are brought to the orphanages despite having a guardian, which can be considered as “orphanage trafficking”. One of the reasons being an excuse for asking for additional funding by showing the increasing number of children living in the institutions. Secondly, according to UNICEF’s report, more than 85 percent of child care homes are located in tourist destinations of Nepal. “This is a way of attracting tourist volunteers, when voluntourism is already illegal in Nepal for the ones holding a tourist visa, and additional fundings,” says Aryal, exposing these children to potential pedophiles. One of the conclusions that came out from this presentation is that there is a huge gap that needs to be filled between to child protection and human trafficking. Nepal still does not recognize ‘orphanage trafficking’ as a form of human trafficking but only as human transportation. “Not being able to address this has left many children we encountered vulnerable,” adds Aryal.
