Low level of civil registrations and vital statistics in Ghana bemoaned by Acting Registrar

The Acting Registrar of the Births and Deaths Registry, Henrietta Lamptey, has expressed concern over the low level of civil registration and vital statistics in Ghana. According to her, Ghana has a long history of civil registration of vital events, but the level of registration and the quality of data produced remain unacceptably low. She noted that the situation is particularly dire in the area of death registration.

Speaking at a workshop for institutions whose operations border on the production of Civil Registration and Vital Statistics (CRVS), Mrs. Lamptey expressed hope that participants would be equipped with the necessary knowledge and skills to improve the process of registering vital events. She emphasized that improving the registration of vital events is crucial to achieving the United Nations’ sustainable development goal target 16.9.

The four-day workshop was organized by the Births and Deaths Registry in collaboration with the Ghana Statistical Service and was part of the CRVS system improvement framework project in Ghana. Sponsored by the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA), the workshop brought together participants from various institutions, including the Ghana Police Service, National Identification Authority, Judicial Service, Ghana Health Service, National Road Safety Authority, Office of the Attorney General’s Department, and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF).

During the workshop, participants were taken through various topics aimed at improving their understanding of the business process models of CRVS. They were also encouraged to treat CRVS as a business and become more client-centered. The participants were split into task teams and challenged to develop solutions to a wide range of Civil Registration and Vital Statistics themes, such as marriages, divorce, birth registration, and death registration, among others.

In a nutshell, the workshop aimed to critically examine the current status of the CRVS system and develop a sustainable strategy to improve and run the system effectively and efficiently. The Chief of the Demographic and Social Statistics Section at the African Centre for Statistics of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA), Dr. William Muhwava, commended the institutions and agencies for the work they have done so far. He encouraged participants to own the CRVS system and drive it, noting that in this time of donor fatigue, there was a need for Ghana to be more proactive in ensuring the country gets things right this time.