The Finding Ad

This passage is taken from the website of Brian Stuy - Research-China.org.

What a Finding Ad is and why you would want one
Since 1999, the orphanages in China are required to run a provincial newspaper advertisement for children that are found and brought to their orphanage. We call them "Finding Ads." These ads contain information about where and when the children were found and which orphanage is caring for them. Originally these were text-only ads, but most provinces now include photographs in their ads. These photographs are usually the earliest available pictures of the children, some from as young as a few weeks old.

The ads are placed by the orphanages as part of the adoption process. It appears from the evidence that in some provinces only the children placed for adoption have an ad placed, since many of the ads bear "retroactive" dates for the children found many years before. I have ads for children found back into 1991. Early finding ads were "text only", meaning that only the child's finding date, location, and the orphanage that housed them were given. Sometimes, however, interesting tidbits of information are included, such as a description of the outfit the child was wearing, physical markings, etc.

Gradually, most provinces have transitioned to photo ads. These "photo ads" often picture children that are newborn to several months old. The ads almost always contain a picture of the child younger than the referral photo received by the families. Occasionally an older child can be found in these photo ads, if their paperwork has finally been submitted to the CCAA. Thus, the most important key to determining if an ad for your child was published isn't necessarily when they were found, but when they were adopted. If you adopted your child in November 1999 or later, most likely an ad was placed for her.

The ads are placed in fairly small newspapers (usually police or legal papers) which have very small circulations. Each ad is published only once, and is contained in a group of ads from the same orphanage. Each orphanage publishes ads a few times a year.