The Issues

A passport to opportunity...

Imagine you are an unregistered child. If you are lucky, you have been immunised, receive health care and go to school.

Yet, as you grow older, you will find the lack of a birth certificate increasingly burdensome:

• You will be unable to sit for national examinations because you have no official school enrollment number.
• You will be unable to get a social security number to confirm your eligibility to work.
• You will be unable to get a passport so that you can travel.

...and that is just a few minor obstacles you may face!

This is the reality for millions of people around the world.  Recent estimates suggest that over 48 million babies – some 36 per cent of all babies born worldwide - are not registered at birth. In South Asia – the region with the most unregistered children – 63 per cent of births are not recorded. In Sub-Saharan Africa, the figure is 55 per cent. Even in industrialised countries, 2 per cent of newborns are not registered.*

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