1. Reasons for changing the Adoption Law in 2026
1.1. Practical circumstances requiring a new law
The 2010 Adoption Law has been applied for 15 years and helped many orphans or children in difficult circumstances find loving families. Thanks to this, children have better opportunities to develop in a real home. However, over time, as society changed and information technology developed, the old law revealed many outdated points. Specifically, citizens still face complicated and cumbersome administrative procedures when applying. Additionally, the old law lacked the involvement of psychological experts or social workers to help families overcome initial challenges when receiving a child.
Society’s perspective has also changed significantly. People now understand that placing children in orphanages or social protection facilities should only be a last resort when there are no other options. Children need a real family to develop naturally. Therefore, the law needs to be amended to make adoption easier and more convenient for citizens, while maintaining strict evaluations to ensure absolute safety for the child and prevent the exploitation of adoption for malicious purposes.
1.2. Implementation progress as of May 2026
To resolve these issues for citizens, on May 6, 2026, the Government issued Resolution No. 123/NQ-CP. This document finalizes three major changes to adoption laws. The ultimate goal of these changes is to protect the best interests of children and help prospective adoptive parents avoid exhaustion from paperwork.
Currently, Deputy Prime Minister Le Tien Chau has been assigned to directly guide this law project. The Ministry of Justice is the primary agency responsible for rewriting the regulations and gathering broad opinions. According to the plan, the new draft law will be finalized and submitted to the Government for review in June 2026 before being presented to the National Assembly. Throughout this process, agencies must ensure that the new law is easy to understand, easy to implement, and truly beneficial to people’s lives.
2. Details of the most prominent new points for citizens
The content of the 2026 amended Adoption Law project is built upon three major changes that bring practical benefits to families and children.
2.1. First change: Clearer regulations on adoption conditions
2.1.1. More practical requirements for adoptive families
The first major change is that the law will evaluate prospective adoptive parents much more thoroughly and practically. Previously, citizens mainly needed to prove they met the conditions on paper, such as being at least 20 years older than the child, owning property, or proving a stable income. However, the upcoming law will not simply look at these financial documents. The reviewing officials will examine the actual living environment of the family, their lifestyle, cultural behavior at home, and whether the adoptive parents are psychologically stable and know how to educate and love children. Regarding the adopted child, the law also requires clear verification of origin to absolutely prevent child trafficking hidden under the guise of adoption.
2.1.2. Transparency in introducing children for adoption
Many citizens wanting to adopt often do not know where to find information and are easily deceived by brokers seeking illegal profits. To protect citizens, the new law strictly regulates which agencies have the authority to introduce children for adoption. The process of connecting children from protection centers to families must be done openly under strict supervision. Citizens will not be allowed to use independent intermediaries or outside brokers; everything must be processed through official channels so that no one loses money unjustly and children remain safe.
2.1.3. Rights as biological children and document revocation cases
The draft clarifies the rights established immediately upon the approval of the adoption decision. The child will have full rights just like a biological child in the family, from care and schooling to property inheritance. Simultaneously, adoptive parents will have full representative rights and the obligation to care for the child.
However, the law also adds scenarios that mandate the termination of this relationship. If it is discovered that adoptive parents have committed acts of abuse or labor exploitation against the child, the Court will intervene immediately to remove the child from that dangerous environment. Notably, if the adoption application is found to have been forged, state agencies have the authority to immediately revoke and cancel the certificate to prevent the use of fake documents for fraud or illegal transactions.
2.2. Second change: Experts accompanying families
2.2.1. Psychological experts supporting families during the application process
When citizens apply for adoption, they will be directly supported by psychological and social work officials. Evaluating whether a family is suitable for a child will no longer be decided solely by local justice officials, but will include practical perspectives from child psychology experts. These staff members will visit homes to talk, understand the family’s desires, and assess whether the child fits the family’s lifestyle. They will also advise adoptive parents on how to bond with and care for the child when they first move in. This helps the family feel less overwhelmed and understand their child better.
2.2.2. Care and support for families after receiving the child
After the family welcomes the child home, the support continues. The new law requires social workers to periodically visit families to check on the child’s health, psychological state, and how well the baby is integrating into the new home. This attention is entirely not meant to bother or cause trouble for citizens, but to promptly offer useful advice if adoptive parents face difficulties in raising the child. It also helps to prevent cases of child abuse or neglect right from the start.
2.3. Third change: Faster and more convenient procedures
2.3.1. Citizens do not have to travel far for procedures involving foreign elements
For eligible Vietnamese citizens wanting to adopt a foreign child, they previously had to process paperwork with the Ministry of Justice at the central level, which was very costly in terms of travel. Soon, the law will allow them to simply visit the provincial People’s Committee where they live to submit their application for confirmation. Transferring the authority to resolve this to the provincial level saves citizens a lot of time and money, and the applications are processed more swiftly.
2.3.2. Being able to submit an adoption application at the most convenient location
Great news for citizens is that the new law will allow everyone to submit domestic adoption applications at any convenient location without being tied to their permanent residence registry (hộ khẩu). For example, a family permanently registered in the Central region but living and working long-term in Hanoi previously had to travel back to their hometown to complete adoption paperwork. With the new regulation, they can submit it directly in Hanoi. This regulation is particularly favorable for people working far from home, allowing them to fulfill their wish of adopting a child without interrupting their jobs.
2.3.3. Reducing cumbersome paperwork thanks to computer lookups
Citizens will no longer have to run around photocopying or notarizing dozens of personal documents to submit. Thanks to the national population database system, when citizens come to process procedures, officials only need to type information into the computer to immediately know their background, marital status, and current residence. The responsibility to look up information now belongs to the state agency, so citizens do not have to prove it themselves. This helps citizens avoid queuing for confirmation papers, reduces printing costs, and most importantly, significantly shortens waiting times.
3. Advantages bringing direct benefits to citizens
3.1. Ensuring the best things for children
The goal of this legal change is always to determine how children can be best protected. Carefully reviewing adoptive parents and strictly forbidding brokers will create a safety shield, helping vulnerable children avoid falling into the hands of those with bad intentions. The regulations allowing the cancellation of papers or the termination of the adoptive relationship when a child is abused are ways for the law to always be able to intervene and protect the child at any time.
3.2. Making the application processing fairer and more professional
The participation of personnel with expertise in psychosocial work will completely change the way applications are resolved. Families will be evaluated fairly and comprehensively by experts, rather than just being judged by lifeless income certificates. Having an expert accompany them both before and after receiving the child helps families feel much more secure when facing major life changes.
3.3. Saving effort, time, and money for everyone
When citizens are allowed to submit applications right where they live, they will not have to take many days off work to return to their hometown for paperwork. Coupled with the state automatically looking up information on the computer, citizens will no longer endure carrying a thick stack of documents to submit, only to have them returned due to a missing paper. Decentralizing authority to the provincial level for procedures related to foreign elements brings similar economic benefits, helping citizens save on transportation and accommodation costs.
4. Concerns and difficulties when applying the law in real life
4.1. Difficulty in finding enough qualified personnel for psychological counseling
Although the idea of bringing psychological and social experts to help citizens is excellent, reality faces a major obstacle: we do not yet have an adequate number of people doing this job. Currently, officials working at the ward and commune levels are mainly proficient in paperwork but have not been deeply trained in how to understand child psychology or counsel families. Entrusting the assessment of suitability to inexperienced people could lead to inaccurate results and impact the child’s entire future. Clearly defining what these workers can and cannot do is also crucial to avoid situations where they pry too deeply into the private lives of citizens’ families.
4.2. Network and database system issues
The policy of not requiring citizens to submit photocopied documents is very good, but it relies entirely on the computer system and the internet. In mountainous or remote areas, computers are often outdated and internet connections can frequently fail. If the connection between the Ministry of Public Security and justice agencies is broken, officials will not be able to look up information. At that point, citizens will have to wait or be forced to return to the old method of submitting photocopied documents manually, causing unnecessary frustration.
4.3. Difficulty in managing finances in international adoption cases
An issue that has long remained sensitive is managing money when foreigners adopt children. In reality, there have been cases where some foreign brokerage organizations arbitrarily visited orphanages to select children, and then offered vague financial donations or support without clear accounting receipts. This action can easily turn a humanitarian effort into a commercial transaction. Although the new law has attempted to tighten this, distinguishing between reasonable application processing fees and donations intended as bribes remains a difficult problem that requires extremely rigorous supervision.
5. Obstacles citizens may face during procedures
5.1. Long waiting times when officials must travel to verify across provinces
Although citizens benefit from submitting applications anywhere, this places a burden on verification officials and inadvertently forces citizens to wait longer. When a person applies in Hanoi but has their permanent residence in Nghe An, the agency in Hanoi must send an official dispatch to Nghe An for verification. The prescribed time for the two sides to exchange information is limited to just a few working days. With a massive workload, local officials in the hometowns can hardly travel to the applicant’s home to inspect and reply on time. Hitches in sending official letters back and forth between the two provinces can cause the time to return results to citizens to extend beyond the prescribed limit, causing exhaustion for the applicant.
5.2. Foreign applications may get bottlenecked at the provincial level
When shifting the processing of applications involving foreign elements from the central to provincial levels, some provinces might become confused. Previously, cases involving foreigners rarely occurred at the provincial level, so local officials do not have much experience in resolving them. Officials must inspect documents issued by foreign countries, understand international law, and verify translations. If officials lack experience or have limited foreign language abilities, their work will slow down, leading to citizens’ applications being held up for a long time at the provincial People’s Committee.
5.3. Difficulties when multiple agencies resolve a single application
The adoption procedure is not something that only one justice agency completes. It requires coordination between the Police, Health departments, and social protection centers. For instance, when an abandoned infant is found, the Police need time to investigate whether there are signs of a crime. The hospital must conduct screenings to see if the child has a severe illness to prioritize finding a family early. However, because each agency has its own confidentiality rules and working methods, they sometimes wait a long time for each other’s documents. The delays between these sectors can unfortunately extend the time citizens must wait to bring their child home.
6. Conclusion
The amended Adoption Law, expected to be submitted to the National Assembly in 2026, brings much good news and hope to both citizens and disadvantaged children. Relaxing procedures, allowing applications to be submitted anywhere, reducing photocopied paperwork, and bringing psychological experts into the process prove that the law is becoming increasingly progressive, friendly, and oriented toward the practical lives of the people. All these changes take the safety and happiness of children as the highest goal.
However, translating the law from paper into real life still faces many barriers. Figuring out how to ensure the computer network runs smoothly so citizens don’t have to wait, or how to get ward officials, health agencies, and police to work together more quickly and seamlessly, remain questions that need early resolution. Citizens absolutely have the right to expect a highly humane new law that makes the journey of bringing children back to a loving family shorter and more fulfilling than ever.
This article is for informational purposes only and does not replace professional legal advice. For support tailored to your situation, please contact HMLF lawyers.
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