IN ASIA AND THE PACIFIC
The Second Ministerial Conference on CRVS took place from the 16th to 19th November, 2021. It has been the occasion to celebrate progress through the CRVS Decade (2015-2024), identify remaining challenges, emphasize CRVS for sustainable development and promote CRVS as the foundation for legal identity.
Recordings, side-events and preparatory and outcome documents can be consulted on this website.
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In preparation of the Second Ministerial Conference on CRVS in Asia and the Pacific held from 16 to 19 November 2021, ESCAP has prepared a report on the situation of CRVS systems in the region. By celebrating the progresses and highlighting the challenges remaining to achieving universal registration systems, the report aims at shaping the priorities for the second half of the Decade.
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The current pandemic is disrupting CRVS systems all over the world, but also highlighting why well-functioning systems are more essential than ever. As a result, the UN Statistics Division, the World Health Organization and the UN Legal Identity Agenda Task Force developed COVID-19 resources offering guidance for civil registration stakeholders on maintaining CRVS activities.
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The CRVS community in Asia and the Pacific has reflected on where it stands at the midpoint of the CRVS Decade (2015-2024) during the Second Ministerial Conference. Following this celebration of progress, many of our partners and member countries are leading actions to fill the remaining gaps. To learn more about CRVS in Asia and the Pacific, please subscribe to our newsletter, which offers a monthly panorama of CRVS actions throughout the region Previous editions can be found here. |
To assist countries in the development of their CRVS systems, several partners such as UNECA, the Centre of Excellence for CRVS systems, Vital Strategies and ESCAP have worked together to create a tool for CRVS improvement. It adopts a modular and step-by-step approach to help in assessing the shortfalls and plan improvements to ensure everyone is registered.
The "Gap Analysis of Current CRVS Registration Practices and Mapping of Potential Data Sources Focusing on Marginalized Populations in Pakistan" report has been released by the Government of Pakistan’s CRVS Technical Support Unit, with the support of ESCAP.
The Technical Support Unit - CRVS in Pakistan recently published, with the support of ESCAP, the report "Gap Analysis of Current CRVS Registration Practices and Mapping of Potential Data-Sources Focusing on Marginalized Populations in Pakistan". Based on reviews of the country's CRVS practices and interviews with stakeholders and beneficiaries, it aims at providing a general overview of the inclusion of marginalized group within the CRVS system.
Each month, our community newsletter puts a spotlight on one person from Asia-Pacific who has gone above and beyond in their efforts to support CRVS programmes, raise awareness of CRVS issues or lead CRVS improvement efforts in their home country. This month we are happy to highlight Mr. Hasibullah Mowahed from Afghanistan.
The Center of Excellence has recently published a compendium of good practices on Harnessing Civil Registration and Vital Statistics (CRVS) in Conflict, Emergencies and Fragile Settings. It provides successful examples of building or managing CRVS systems in times of crises such as conflicts or natural disasters. These situations put strain on CRVS systems while also making registration more critical for people to access their rights.
The Government of Bangladesh, supported by the Data for Health initiative, has started implementing a nationwide program to strengthen civil registration systems. The model was first implemented in Kaliganj province of Bangladesh for several years and uses frontline medical workers to assist with civil registration of births and deaths. This change of approach has lessened the burden on families and has gained high level government support and strong collaboration between ministries.
In 2019, the CRVS Department and the Vanuatu Electoral Office (VEO) established a joint nationwide project to undertake combined civil and voter registration, issuing National ID cards.
A new identity checking system has been established in Vanuatu for coming provincial elections to in May. Scanners will be used to double-check voter's identity and voting eligibility based on their national ID cards.
Globally and across Central Asia, UNHCR has been advocating to end statelessness through the #IBelong campaign and has celebrated recent efforts in Turkmenistan to end statelessness by 2024.
In 2014, governments across Asia-Pacific committed to strengthening CRVS systems and advance universal civil registration to support good governance, health and development.
However, due to a lack of data, we do not know if the most vulnerable people are being registered, which could mean hard to reach and marginalized people, including women and girls, remain invisible, compounding the inequality they face.
