Establishing a committee of African registrars general: the rationale: background paper 1

Abstract

It has been seven years since Africa began to write its own chapter on the improvement of civil registration and vital statistics systems. The civil registration and vital statistics systems not only provide individuals with legal documents on occurrence of vital events, realizing basic human rights to a name and identity, but they are also a source of vital events data, including causes of death, essential for good governance, policy planning and monitoring at the national and lower administrative levels. ECA is organizing a task force meeting to deliberate on the merit of establishing a regional committee of registrars’ genera entrusted with the management and improvement of civil registration in their respective countries and in the region, and the purpose of such a committee. The draft terms of reference and the rules and procedures that would govern the operations of the proposed committee of African registrars’ general are provided as separate documents. The working modalities are proposed to serve as a tool for the smooth functioning of the committee. The final output of this consultative work was the Principles for Vital Statistics from civil registration, which was endorsed by the Economic and Social Council in 1953. Although the focus of the publication was on vital statistics, it also covered civil registrations. Interest in improving civil registration and vital statistics as a system was stressed by the United Nations Statistical Commission.