BARBADIANS are being encouraged to adopt local children and in particular boys.

This plea came from an official of the Child Care Board at yesterday's launch of its adoption campaign pamphlet at its Cheapside Road, The City, headquarters.

Senior child care officer and coordinator of the Foster Care and Adoption Committee of the board, Esther Bayley, said the pamphlet was to sensitise the public about the role of adoption, adopting parents and what adoption meant.

The pamplet also outlines the procedures for adoption and how people approved by the Child Care Board could become the legal parents of a child that would have the same legal status of a biological child of the adopting family.

She said it was important to sensitise the public that there were children in Barbados who needed a loving family and the opportunity to have someone they could call mummy or daddy.

One of the primary challenges the board faced was that most people interested in adoption preferred baby girls.

"But there are also males who need to be adopted, especially over the age of five years old, and that is a challenge," Bayley said.

"People need to realise that boys also need a family too. We want people to understand that both genders share the same feelings and experience the same problems. We want that boys are given the same opportunities.

"They are the ones that remain in the residential care (children homes) and become institutionalised. We want members of the public to have a heart and show love and be there for the boys and the girls, especially those over five years old," she said.

Bayley said the board was encouraging Barbadians to consider taking children into temporary foster care.

In the period April 2008 to March 2009, five children were adopted. Most people showing interest in adopting are single women. (MS)