rances Fitzgerald: Minister said the agreement with the US was good news

Adoptions into Ireland have dropped dramatically in the last four years from 307 in 2009 to 117 in 2012, new figures show.

But numbers may increase again following the signing of a new agreement between Ireland and the US in the last few days and the accreditation of an Irish adoption agency in Vietnam.

In 2009, a total of 307 children were adopted into Ireland including 136 children from Vietnam, 100 from Russia and 21 from Ethiopia. The balance of children came from 11 other countries including China, Mexico and Kazakhstan, according to figures supplied to the Sinn Fein Deputy Pearse Doherty in response to a parliamentary question.

Total figure In 2010, the total figure for inter-country adoptions was 200, and was down to 188 in 2011 and to 117 last year.

There were no adoptions from Vietnam last year or in 2011 and adoptions from Ethiopia dropped from a high of 75 in 2010 to 32 in 2012. Some 124 children were adopted from Russia in 2011, and 49 were adopted last year.

The drop in adoptions followed Irelands ratification of the Hague Convention on Inter-country Adoption in November 2010. The convention outlines standards and procedures that should be followed when children are adopted from one country into another.

Signed convention The ratification meant children could only be adopted into Ireland from countries that had signed up to the convention. Neither Russia nor Ethiopia have signed it and after 2010, children could only be adopted from those countries if they had already been approved.

In 2009, a bilateral adoption agreement between Ireland and Vietnam lapsed. The lapse followed a series of scandals relating to fraudulent adoptions.

In September last year a new agreement was signed with Vietnam and the country recently accredited an adoption agency to work with Irish couples. It is expected adoptions will begin again with Vietnam in the next few weeks.