Digitization of Civil Registry

ZIZ News–11th September, 2013–The idea of recording unique identification for individuals took effect in the federation around 1885. This identification is in the form of a certificate of birth, death or marriage -major events in our lives.

St. Kitts and Nevis Civil Registry is a department of the Ministry Of Health. The records of the civil registry are kept in books, stored here at the Basseterre Health Centre. The books contain information on births and deaths from as early as 1859 and marriage information from 1885.

Because of the importance of this information the modernization of the civil registry system has become a priority for the government of St. Kitts and Nevis with the support of the OAS.

Starrett Greeene -OAS local Representative in St. Kitts and Nevis says there is an urgency to preserve this information for those who need it.

As you can see overtime the quality of the books containing the deaths, births and marriage information have detiorated making it difficult to make sense of the writing and even physically destroying this valuable source of information.

The idea to copy the civil registry into the computer and produce an electronic copy would not only secure the information and preserve its quality, but make it accessible for generations to come.

In our next report on the modernization of the civil registry we’ll look at the Actual digitization process.