ADOPTION is fast becoming a thing of the past, with just six Tasmanian families successfully adopting a child in the past year.
National adoption rates are at the lowest level in 25 years, with 333 adoptions Australia-wide in 2011-12, the latest figures from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare show.
It's a drop of almost 80 per cent from the 1500 adoptions that took place in 1987-88.
The head of the AIHW child welfare unit, Tim Beard, said foster-care alternatives, contraception, changing social attitudes and welfare support for single parents had contributed to the drop in adoptions.
The six Tasmanian adoptions contrast with the 1000 Tasmanian children in foster care last year.
They were removed from their families because of neglect or abuse.
State Government figures showed the number of children in foster care doubled in the past eight years.
Two of the children adopted in Tasmania last year were from Australia, while four were from overseas countries, including the Philippines, Ethiopia and South Korea.
Nationwide, 184 of the 333 children adopted were Australian, marking the first time in 12 years that Australian adoptions outnumbered adoptions from other countries.
Mr Beard said this reflected changing international attitudes towards adoption, with many countries now seeking to have children adopted within their own country.
Despite this, eight Tasmanian families were among the 203 applicants to register their interest in inter-country adoptions last year.
"Despite social changes and medical advancements, we're still seeing the number of people looking to adopt go up every year," Mr Beard said.
"However, the numbers would probably be even bigger if we didn't have people looking at options like IVF or surrogacy."
The AIHW report showed most Australian birth mothers were unmarried and their median age was 22 nine years younger than the median age of all mothers who gave birth in 2010.
The age range for birth mothers was 15 to 43.
Relationships Australia Tasmania chief executive Mat Rowell said forced adoptions in the 1950s to 1980s had contributed to a shift in government policy about adoption.
He said there was now a stronger focus on keeping children in their family unit or supporting extended family members to care for them.
"We've seen the Government apologise for past policies and now we've seen the Tasmanian Government apologise to parents affected by [forced] adoptions," Mr Rowell said.
"This has changed the way society thinks about adoption, [and] now of course there is a whole stack of government support and practical support for people when they have children unexpectedly.
"Socially it's much more acceptable for people to raise children in a range of different circumstance we see single parents and gay couples raising children, and blended families."
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