OSAKA -- Japan's foster care system offers homes to children who cannot live with their parents due to financial hardship, neglect or other circumstances. In July, a shocking figure was revealed regarding the public awareness of this system, leaving people on the front lines searching through trial and error for better ways to improve recognition and understanding.

According to the Children and Families Agency and other sources, about 42,000 children nationwide are unable to live with their parents for various reasons. Most currently reside in child welfare institutions. Foster care offers an opportunity for these children to be raised in a warm family environment instead.

The government is promoting the system, but as of the end of fiscal 2024, the placement rate with foster parents or similar caregivers stood at only 26.3%.

Awareness remains low nationwide

In April, Osaka Metropolitan University professor Kayoko Ito and the certified nonprofit organization Japan Children Support Association, based in Osaka, conducted a survey on awareness of the foster care system and related issues. They received responses online from 5,194 men and women in their 20s and older across Japan.

The results showed that 52.6% said they knew "nothing at all" about "foster parents for child rearing," who take children into their homes for a certain period. Only 2.8% said they understood the system in detail. Even when respondents who said they knew its general outline were included, the figure rose to just 14.6%. Awareness of "adoptive foster parents," in which the goal is to establish a legal parent-child relationship through adoption, was also limited. Only 19.7% said they understood the system either in detail or broadly.

In a multiple-response question about challenges people face when considering becoming foster parents, survey-takers most frequently cited the financial burden. That was followed by compatibility and relationship-building with a foster child, such as whether the child would grow attached to them or how to handle adolescence, as well as anxiety about relations with the child's birth parents.

Advocates shift focus of awareness campaigns

In response to the findings, Shinobu Iwasa, the director of the association, 53, said she felt a strong need to make a major shift in public relations efforts. Rather than the group's previous awareness-raising message of, "Please know that there is a system called foster care," she said, it must first help people understand what foster parents are.

Foster parents for child rearing in Japan, for example, receive allowances intended to cover the costs of raising foster children, including living expenses. Iwasa said her organization had previously been reluctant to emphasize financial assistance, fearing that people might pursue foster parenting primarily for money.

However, if the financial burden is an obstacle to considering foster parenting, she said, "We have to actively let people know that support for foster parents exists." The association has since begun stating on awareness posters and handouts that foster parents for child rearing receive about 150,000 yen (about $950) every month.

How foster parenting affects foster parents themselves

Iwasa also said she wants to communicate not only that the system can lead to the happiness of foster children, but also what kind of impact it has on the lives of foster parents themselves.

Iwasa is a foster parent herself and has had a range of experiences while engaging with the child in her care. There have been both joys and challenges. The girl she welcomed when the child was 4 is now 19.

The young woman now says, "I cannot change the past, but I want to live for the future," and is enjoying her own life, Iwasa said. "I worked hard because I wanted to help this child reclaim her life. As a parent, I, too, was able to feel truly happy," she said with a smile.

The association continues to support foster parents, but social understanding is also essential to promote the system. Some companies, for example, allow employees to take childcare leave only for their biological children. On Oct. 4, observed in Japan as "Foster Parent Day," the association conducted a nationwide awareness campaign through social media. "We want to support the courage to become a foster parent," Iwasa said emphatically.

(Japanese original by Yumi Shibamura, Osaka City News Department)