This blog article is continued from the blog A Gold Mine for Georgia: Surrogacy and Migration, which you can read here.
Georgia’s surrogacy industry is deeply rooted in a network of intermediaries who locate surrogates from Central Asia and bring them to clinics nationwide. Agents and medical staff are critical in facilitating and controlling surrogate migration, medical procedures, and social interactions. Throughout my fieldwork, conversations with surrogacy agents offer important insights.
The organization and management of surrogacy programs in Georgia are complex and well-coordinated. The clinic where I conducted my observations relies on a network of managers and agents to facilitate the surrogacy process, as is common in Georgia. Six managers at the clinic oversee approximately 50 surrogates each, ensuring they attend medical appointments, follow required protocols, and stay in Georgia during their pregnancies. One fertility specialist, Tamila, supervises nearly 200 surrogates.
Embryo Transfer Across Borders: What is the Law?
While Georgian law allows single women to undergo IVF, only a married or cohabiting heterosexual couple who have lived together for at least one year can enter a notarized surrogacy contract and have a child through surrogacy (According to Article 143 of the Law of Georgia on Health Protection (Parliament of Georgia 1997) and 2020 amendments to the order of the Minister of Justice (Minister of Justice of Georgia 2012).
A married couple or single woman who have used the services of a surrogate mother are recognized as the legal parents of the child (Minister of Justice 2012). After the birth of a baby through surrogacy, the birth certificate lists only the names of the commissioning couple and not the surrogate, ensuring the surrogate has no legal parental claim. For the child to receive a passport, the commissioning parents must submit several documents, including the Georgian birth certificate with their names issued by the Ministry of Justice, the medical birth record issued by the hospital, the embryo protocol, the surrogacy contract, and additional paperwork depending on their country’s embassy requirements. This process is arduous, requiring significant time and understanding of Georgian law to navigate the legal system.
Direct communication between surrogates and commissioning parents is rare, as clinics and agents fear that surrogates may ask for additional compensation or that parents may intervene too much in the process. Although these barriers to communication are enforced to protect both parties, it can often lead to misunderstandings. An American couple I met who recently had twins via surrogacy
expressed their frustration that they could not thank their surrogate as she had been discharged before they arrived. Later, the surrogate told me that she believed the couple ungrateful. She did not believe me when I relayed their attempt to reach her. Such cases highlight how enforced distance - intended to streamline the process – can undermine the autonomy of both parties, creating a surrogacy experience that feels detached from individual moral concerns and raising important questions about the limits of reproductive ethics.
Emotional labor
Agents do more than simply recruit surrogates from Central Asia to come to Tbilisi. They mediate the emotional and psychological aspects of the surrogacy journey, as agent Valeriy describes: “The most difficult part is listening to their stories. For these women, surrogacy represents a leap into a different social stratum. They buy housing, pay off debts. They’re surviving back home. I always have to think about their temperaments—this one has a good character, another has a bad one—and where each is from because that also matters.”
Agents go beyond ensuring that the medical side of surrogacy is handled, acting as emotional mediators, cultural navigators, and entrepreneurial facilitators. They juggle the concerns of surrogates—many of whom feel isolated and underappreciated—with the demands of international clients to provide a streamlined service.
Maintaining control over surrogates' movements and behaviors is one aspect of this work. Lisa’s role involves ensuring that surrogates enter the country smoothly but border issues frequently arise, with some women being turned away at the border. To prevent this, the clinic must provide official invitation letters, stating that the surrogates are entering for medical purposes, to ensure their passage into Georgia. “One surrogate wasn’t let into Georgia—she forgot to bring her invitation,” Lisa said. “She was sent to Turkey, spent a week there, and then was supposed to return, but she was late to the flight. She is stupid. I had to repurchase her tickets.”
Destination Pregnancies
Surrogates must contend with the tight control clinics exert over their lives. Most surrogates are required to stay in Georgia for the entire duration of their pregnancy, with the option for partial presence which allows them to return home between 12 and 26 weeks into a typical 40-week pregnancy. To persuade surrogates to stay in Georgia for the entire term, the clinic reduces compensation for those who choose the partial presence option. However, the isolation and time away from family can take a toll. “It seems like a vacation. Very boring. You get rest” Aigerim explained, “but I also miss my daughter.”
Many surrogates, despite signing contracts for the full-term relocation, express a strong desire to visit their families. The clinic’s discouragement of this practice often leads to conflicts, as surrogates begin to feel increasingly isolated and emotionally strained by the prolonged separation from their loved ones. When one surrogate demanded to return home despite contractual obligations, Lisa recalled: “She said I must order her tickets, taxi, etc. At some point, she just left and banged the doors.”
Women who travel to Georgia typically live in clinic-provided apartments for the duration of their pregnancy. Aigerim shares a two-bedroom apartment with another surrogate from Central Asia in a spacious, newly renovated building on the outskirts of Tbilisi. Sharing apartments encourages clinic surveillance and mutual oversight, frequently leading to conflicts and tensions among surrogates.
Surrogates can earn a bonus from the clinic for reporting roommates who violate clinic-imposed rules, such as drinking, smoking, or bringing men into the apartment. This mutual monitoring system fosters a mistrust climate, as surrogates sometimes accused each other of misbehavior to demand relocations or earn extra money.
I received multiple messages from Aigerim describing how her roommate screamed at her over disagreements about living habits. The roommate reported to the clinic that Aigerim had broken items in the apartment, which Aigerim claimed had been damaged by the roommate’s child. During an argument, Aigerim threw salt at her, prompting the roommate—convinced Aigerim was a witch—to leave and refuse to take any belongings the salt had touched, believing they were cursed. Even the clinic staff sided with the roommate, openly sharing their belief in Aigerim’ supernatural powers. Aigerim, who is a self-identified tarot specialist and clairvoyant, found these accusations both amusing and frustrating, describing herself as “a good-hearted person who can’t perform black magic.” These incidents demonstrate how surrogates invoke cultural idioms like witchcraft to navigate interpersonal tensions and reinforce social hierarchies.
Despite shared living arrangements presenting a source of tension, they can also facilitate the formation of deep friendships. Many surrogates have reconnected with women they met in previous surrogacy programs in Russia or elsewhere, and these bonds often extend beyond their time in Georgia. Dinara had been a surrogate twice before in St. Petersburg for a Chinese and a Russian couple, when she met another surrogate, Rosa, who became her good friend. Back then, they lived in a large house with 40 other women and their children, starkly contrasting Georgia’s more intimate living arrangements where only a handful of women share an apartment. Rosa introduced Dinara to her current surrogacy program in Tbilisi. Rosa, now a surrogate in Georgia with her 7-year-old daughter, continues working as a beautician, offering nail and hair services to other women in their apartments. These brief examples offer a glimpse of women’s experiences in Georgia involved in surrogacy work, which illustrates the complex and often precarious nature of facilitating and practicing surrogacy across borders.
