Where can China's abandoned babies go?

An infant in an incubator receives care at a hospital in Jinhua, Zhejiang province, on Tuesday. The newborn was rescued from a sewer pipe in a residential building last week. Zhong Cheng / for China Daily

(ECNS) -- An abandoned baby in Zhengzhou city was found last Friday with ants crawling on her face, only days after China banned individuals and groups from secretly adopting abandoned infants.

China's Ministry of Civil Affairs announced last Tuesday that anyone who finds an abandoned child must immediately notify the police and the local residential committee, as opposed to just informally adopting the child on the spot.

The ban came after several cases of abandoned or unsupervised children had surfaced in the media, but whether or not it will create a brighter future for orphans in China has since become the source of much debate.

In May, a newborn became trapped in a sewer pipe after his mother gave birth to him above a squat toilet in Zhejiang province. The unmarried 22-year-old woman had kept her pregnancy secret, and the police, after initial investigations, deemed it an accident.

Meanwhile in Nanjing, two girls, aged one and three, starved to death in their home after their drug-addicted mother disappeared and the father was put in prison.

Such tragedies have brought into question the ability of young Chinese people to responsibly care for children. Moreover, the traditional preference for male heirs, the social stigma attached to unwed mothers and rampant poverty all contribute to child abandonment.

By 2012, there were 570,000 parentless children in China, an increase of 11 percent from the same period last year, according to the Ministry of Civil Affairs. And every year, there are about 10 thousand newly abandoned children, more than 80 percent of whom are adopted by individuals and groups.

Yet private adoption has never been greatly encouraged in China, as the government fears a lack of regulation could spur human trafficking.

Last January, an orphanage run by a street vendor in Lankao, Henan province, came under the spotlight when seven children were killed in a fire. Yuan Lihai, 48, had used her home as a private orphanage for 26 years, adopting over 100 abandoned children.

The fact that a poor street vendor was adopting orphans stirred the public conscience, yet many accused her of profiting from the babies.

Zhang Wenjuan, deputy director of the Beijing Children's Legal Aid and Research Center, said the new government circular sets out measures that should be taken when an abandoned baby is found. It requires that police attempt to find the parents or guardians, but if they fail, the children must be transferred to a government-sanctioned nursing home for temporary care.

However, China's under-funded state orphanage system has come under scrutiny for being unable to adequately provide shelter for the country's massive number of abandoned children.

"The government has put a stop to individuals raising abandoned babies privately, and since there are not enough welfare institutions, the growing number of orphans outside official agencies is obvious," said Gu Xiaoming, a sociology professor at Fudan University.

According to official statistics cited by the China Daily, only 64 of the country's 2,853 counties have child welfare homes. The Ministry of Civil Affairs has promised to help 500 more build facilities by the end of 2015.

"The number of welfare agencies is far from enough," said Xia Xueluan, a professor at the Institute of Sociology and Anthropology of Peking University. "All levels of government are not paying enough attention to child welfare agencies."

Liu Guoqiang, a professor at the Sichuan International Studies University, said a welfare agency can't replace a family -- the government should explore a legal and efficient way for the adoption of abandoned children.