This expert paper by Forget Me Not Australia was published as a part of the Global Study on Sexual Exploitation of Children in Travel and Tourism and it presents as a case study the story of the organization from its founding to its current work.
Forget Me Not (FMN), an Australian NGO, established an orphanage in Nepal and was soon asked to take over operations of another orphanage in Uganda. After conducting an audit of the Ugandan orphanage and realizing that the "orphanage directors were siphoning funds for personal profit," FMN investigated further and discovered that the children were not orphans at all, "but rather had been taken from their families for the purpose of being falsely presented as orphans to live in the orphanage and elicit international funding." FMN then reviewed its own orphanage in Nepal and similarly found that the girls had been purposefully displaced and separated from their families in order to create an orphanage. "As a result of these experiences, FMN began to focus on the issue of children being displaced from their biological families for the purpose of garnering international funding for orphanages."
The expert paper explains the situation in Nepal and Uganda, discussing how orphanages are typically built near tourist centers, so as to position themselves as a tourist destination and garner international visitors and their donations. The paper concludes with best practices and recommendations for preventing the institutionalization of children, keeping families together, and upholding the rights of children.
