SUE KRAWITZ

IMPILO

impilo.org.za/

What does your company do?

Impilo, a designated child protection organisation with adoption accreditation for national and inter-country adoptions, places children in temporary safe care whilst carrying out intensive social work and child protection services, so that children can be placed in a permanent family environment as early as possible after removal. Registered as a Non-Profit Organisation (055-213-NPO), Non Profit Company (NPC-2003/012123/08) and Public Benefit Organisation (PBO – 930005449), we provide services in the Gauteng region to approximately 150 children at any given time who are orphaned, vulnerable or abandoned. We provide services to children up to 18 years old; however, 90% of the children we serve are under 6 years of age. Services are provided from our head office in Fairvale Johannesburg, which houses the administrative staff and our Mpepu project, which facilitates our temporary safe care work that caters for 12 children. We have regional offices in Johannesburg, Ekurhuleni (Benoni). Additionally, 135 children at any given time are placed within our safe bed network (within nine partnering facilities). We believe that children should be raised in a family environment in which they can thrive, and therefore we strive to keep children in families and avoid removal where appropriate, and return children to their family as quickly as possible after removal or find an alternative family, ie adoption. The family of origin is always the first option for a child’s placement, and alternative placement is considered and pursued only if this is not viable. 95% of our children are placed in a family environment within two years, and because of careful screening and monitoring, 98% of these placements are successful.