The National AIDS Council of Zimbabwe said on Wednesday it will soon launch a campaign to encourage society to foster and adopt orphans, especially those orphaned by HIV/AIDS, so that they grow up within a family set-up.

The council's national orphan and vulnerable children coordinator Sibusisiwe Marunda said orphans left in the streets or in institutions became delinquent as they lacked parental guidance and support.

"We want to encourage communities to foster and adopt orphans to enable them to learn life skills and have relationships, things that they will not find in institutions," she said.

Marunda said Zimbabwe had an estimated 800,000 HIV/AIDS orphans and it was estimated that at least 5,000 children in Zimbabwe lived in institutions while about 12,000 lived on the streets.

Director of Social Welfare in the Ministry of Public Service, Labor and Social Welfare Sydney Mhishi said the government had developed the framework of the National Orphan Care Policy and it was now up to stakeholders to implement it in their different ways to achieve the intended objective of ensuring orphans and the vulnerable were supported.

The Orphan Care Policy, which the government adopted in 1999, blends the provisions of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Children, the African Union Charter on the Welfare and Rights of Children and the general traditions of Zimbabwean culture.

Source: Xinhua