Civil registration and vital statistics systems in South Africa

1
Civil registration and vital statistics systems
in South Africa
2
Outline of presentation

• Availability of vital statistics
• Legal framework
• Civil registration
• Acquiring data on divorces
• Process flows
• Dissemination of information
• Challenges
• Key stakeholders
• Strategic targets
• Concluding remarks

3
Availability of vital statistics

• Available statistics
• Live births
• Foetal deaths (stillbirths)
• Deaths
• Marriages
• Divorces
• Not available (or not processed)
• Annulments
• Judicial separations
• Adoptions
• Legitimations

4
Legal framework

• Births, deaths and stillbirths
• Department of Home Affairs
• Births and deaths registration Act (Act No. 51 of
  1992)
• Marriages
• Department of Home Affairs
• Marriage Act (Act No. 25 of 1961)
• Divorces
• Department of Justice and Constitutional
  Development
• Divorce Act (Act No. 70 of 1979)

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Civil registration system (1)

• Births registration
• Department of Home Affairs
• To be registered within 30 days of birth
• Between 30 days and 1 year
• Between 1 year and 14 years
• 15 years and older
• No registration of birth is done for a person who
  dies before notice of birth has been given
• A forename and a surname are required for
  registration
• Birth outside the country notice given to the
  head of SA diplomatic or consular mission, or a
  regional representative in SA

6
Civil registration system (2)

• Death registration
• Department of Home Affairs
• Natural cause to be registered as soon as
  practicable by a person present at death, or who
  became aware of the death, or who has charge of
  the burial concerned
• Medical practitioners/professional nurses
• Other than natural cause Refer to a police
  officer (Inquests Act, 1959)
• District surgeon/forensic pathologists
• Death outside SA Death certificate or other
  similar document issued by the authority
  concerned in the country in which the death
  occurred required to register the death in SA
• No burial takes place unless notice of the death
  has been given and burial order provided

7
Civil registration system (3)

• Stillbirth registration
• Department of Home Affairs
• At least 26 weeks of gestation
• Natural cause medical practitioner present or
  who examined corpse shall certify the death any
  person present at the still-birth makes the
  declaration of the still-birth
• Any doubt if the child was stillborn report to a
  police officer
• No burial takes place unless notice of stillbirth
  has been given and burial order provided

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Civil registration system (4)

• Improvements in birth and death registration
• Main stakeholders
• Department of Home Affairs
• Department of Health
• Department of Social Development
• Activities
• Registration at the Department of Home Affairs
  offices
• On-line registration at selected hospitals
• Mobile trucks to access hard-to-reach areas
• Mobilisation by Department of Social Development
  for birth registration required for the up-take
  of child support grant for the poor

9
Civil registration system (5)

• Marriages
• Department of Home Affairs (DHA)
• Civil marriages undertaken by licensed marriage
  officers (DHA officials or priests)
• Offices of the DHA, chapels or religious
  buildings
• Customary marriages
• Recognition of Customary Marriages Act
• Stats SA in the process of acquiring data on
  registered customary marriages

10
Acquiring data on divorces

• Department of Justice and Constitutional
  Development through its divorce courts
• Stats SA designed a form requiring provision of
  information from divorcees after divorce decree
  has been granted
• Population group
• Age at time of divorce
• Occupation at time of divorce
• Marital status at time of marriage
• Duration of marriage
• Number of times married
• Solemnisation of present marriage
• Matrimonial property system
• Number of minor children involve (age, sex)

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Process flow births and marriages
Department of Home Affairs (DHA) captures data
DHA makes data available on main frame
Data downloaded via ftp / Collected from SITA
Data editing
Data analysis and report writing
Dissemination of report
12
Process flow divorces
Divorce forms received through the post
Sorting forms by year of divorce and court name
Data capturing of all variables on the form
Data editing
Data analysis and report writing
Dissemination of report
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Process flow deaths and stillbirths
Data Capture (ID variables)
Collection
Pasting
Sorting
STORES
Data Capture QA
Export to Editing
Pre-coding
Coding
Data Analysis
Derivation 0f UCD
Publication Dissemination
Data Editing
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Dissemination

• Annual statistical releases
• Hard copies
• CD containing unit records of data for
• Marriages and divorces
• Deaths and stillbirths
• Statistical releases and data published on the
  web
• www.statssa.gov.za
• Special tables provided on request

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Challenges births and marriages

• No control over collection of information
  (registration and completion of forms)
• No control over data processing
• Cannot undertake quality assurance at different
  stages of data processing
• No access to original forms
• No way of verifying or investigating
  non-plausible cases
• Not all variables are made available to
  Statistics South Africa
• Limited variables for in-depth analysis
• Late or non-registration of births
• Registration of customary marriages

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Challenges divorces

• There are several courts that deal with divorce
  cases and no central point for collection of the
  forms
• Shortage of questionnaire in courts
• No control over completion of forms
• Non-response to certain questions
• Return of questionnaires by clients
• Through the post office which results in delays
  or forms getting lost
• Inability to determine complete coverage of
  granted divorces
• Use court rolls not all courts send their court
  rolls
• Initiative of the DoJCD in collaboration with DHA
  and STATS SA to develop a tool for recording
  cases
• Mistakes introduced by capturing

17
Challenges deaths and stillbirths

• No control over collection of information
  (registration and completion of forms)
• No control over completion of forms
• Data subject to content errors and omissions
• E.g. information on education, occupation,
  industry, place-name, population group
  incomplete and therefore limits analysis
• Under registration of deaths particularly among
  children and those in the rural areas
• Misreporting and insufficient reporting of causes
  of death on the death notification forms
• Late registration of deaths
• Time-lag between the event, registration and
  publication of information

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Late registrations
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Challenges general

• Dependence on other departments for data
• Limited information for in-depth analysis on
  births, deaths, marriages and divorces
• Non-compliance with legislation governing
  registration on the side of the public
• Inability to provide information at geographic
  levels lower than province

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Key stakeholders

• Department of Home Affairs
• Department of Justice and Constitutional
  Development
• Department of Health
• Department of Social Development
• South African Social Security Agency
• Department of Provincial and Local Government
• Family and Marriage Society of South Africa
• Research and academic institutions
• UN agencies
• Statistical agencies from other countries
• Business community

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Strategic targets

• Collaboration and statistical partnership with
  suppliers
• Building capacity to collect (and process where
  applicable) quality information
• Participate in initiatives on increasing
  registration coverage
• Integrate systems, to enable timely access and
  proper tracking of information
• Process management
• Integrated storage management system that
  electronically tracks received forms across all
  series
• Automate - for timeliness and accuracy
• Review and revamp all series - to improve
  content, quality and presentation of reports
• Document procedures and guidelines for processing
  various series - to enable standard application
  of procedures

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Concluding remarks

• Civil registration improving in South Africa
• Live births 81 (2007) Deaths 83 (2006)
• Improvements required for completeness of
  registration and complete and accurate completion
  of forms
• Concerted effort by all stakeholders, including
  the public, required
• Statistics produced depend on the quality of
  input data, and the need for enhanced efforts to
  register vital events.
• Wider use of the data leads to improvements in
  the quality of the data over time.

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Contact details
Statistics South Africa http//www.statssa.gov.za
1. Ntebaleng Chobokoane (Executive Manager
Health and Vital Statistics) NtebalengC_at_statssa.go
v.za 2. Maletela Tuoane-Nkhasi (Manager
Births and Deaths) MaletelaT_at_statssa.gov.za 3.
Susanna Ubomba-Jaswa (Manager Marriages and
Divorces) SusannaUJ_at_statssa.gov.za Department of
Home Affairs http//www.dha.gov.za 1. Thomas
Sigama (Director National Population
Register) Thomas.Sigama_at_dha.gov.za