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Millions of Children "Invisible": UNICEF LONDON (Reuters) - Millions of the world's neediest children are not even a blip on the radar of their own governments because there is no record of their birth, the United Nation's Children's Fund UNICEF said on Wednesday. In its annual State of the World's Children report "Excluded and Invisible," UNICEF said one-third of the estimated 150 million children born worldwide each year were not registered -- and the number was growing. "Birth registration is vital to really start to know the extent of the problem, how many children there are out there, how many abuses are going on," report author David Anthony told Reuters in an interview. Children not registered at birth may never officially exist, making it easy for governments to ignore them and for traffickers to make them disappear without risk of retribution. http://www.icta.lk/Insidepages/News&event/230407whatsnew.asp
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Sri Lanka: Birth Certificates
in 10 Minutes – Now at
Thimibirigasyaya!
Yet another chapter unfolds towards the restructuring of the issuance process of Birth, Marriage and Death certificates. According to the Information and Communication Technology Agency of Sri Lanka that functions under the Presidential Secretariat, 800,000 birth certificates have been digitized at the Thimbirigasyaya Divisional Secretariat.
The digitized birth certificates were opened for public viewing today by Minister of Public Administration and Home Affairs, Karu Jaysuriya. Minister of Home Affairs – Chandrasiri Gajadeera, Secretary to the Ministry of Public Administration- D. Dissanayake, Prof. V.K. Samaranayake, Chairman - ICTA and Reshan Dewapura, COO – ICTA were also be present. The special project named the ‘BMD Document Conversion Project’ held in line with the eDivisional Secretariat (eDS) programme will enable Divisional Secretariats (DS) to cut processing time to as little as 5 minutes in the issuance of vital documents, said Wasantha Deshapriya, Programme Director, ICTA. The BMD project was launched today at the Thimibirigasyaya DS, said W.N.R.P. Wijayapala, Divisional Secretary. It is also the DS with the most number of births and deaths registered. Three million births, 600,000 deaths and 800,000 marriages have been registered.Approximately 100 requests for copies of vital documents are received daily, however, Mr. Wijepala points out that administrative issues make it difficult to cope with the demand. In order to remedy this, the Ministry of Public Administration and Home Affairs and the ICT Agency of Sri Lanka have taken this project forward. Prof. V.K. Samaranayake, Chairman, ICTA says the digitizing process of vital documents is a tedious one, but it gives the government yet another opportunity to improve its services for the people. He also pointed out that points out that this project will also lead the way in terms of curbing crime with relation to false BMD certificates. It will also ensure that population data in this regard is stored utilizing a secure and effective method, allowing persons to easily gain access to their personal details and as well as adopting a long-term approach. Currently, the people face numerous difficulties in obtaining copies of Birth, Marriage and Death certificates. The BMD Document Conversion Project will not only turn things around in this regard but will also give the Divisional Secretariats a much needed citizen-centric approach. This project was first implemented at the Colombo DS, after which, it was replicated at the Dehiwala, Moratuwa and Ratmalana DSs, digitizing 2.2 million birth certificates. The project is funded by ‘Plan Sri Lanka’, while the ICT Agency of Sri Lanka is the implementing organization of the project. This project entails digitizing close to 3 million vital documents at the Thimibirigasyaya DS. |
