APPROXIMATELY 2,000,000 birth, 1,000,000 marriage and 500,000 death registration records must be entered in their entirety within a three-year time frame.

This means that a minimum of 4000 birth/death/marriage registration records (correct entries) must be entered daily.

This is according to the Terms of Reference (TORs) for the consultancy firm which will undertake the computerisation of the General Register Office (GRO) records. An advertisement is currently out recruiting consultancy services for this project.

The objective of this project is to ensure that all the records for the period 1869 to 2015 are correctly entered in the Civil Events Registration System (CERS), to allow for the complete automation of the process for the generation of certificates, verification, easy retrieval and storage.

The GRO is the government agency responsible for the registration of civil events (births, deaths, marriages and adoptions) and the issuance of the relevant documents to support this function. As part of its mandate for the continuous improvement in delivery of service to citizens, and to enhance efficiency and effectiveness, the GRO acquired the CERS.

An indispensable requirement for the CERS is the need to take data from the paper-based birth, death and marriage registration records (held by the GRO) and enter these into CERS database from the year 1869 to 2015.

It is envisaged that upon completion of this project, the process for distributing new birth, death and marriage certificates will be significantly reduced, and will allow for easy retrieval of information.

The consultant/firm will be required to ensure that for each record entered, there is 100% accuracy. Weekly status reports on proposed targets and achievements and monthly reports on data entries completed must be submitted.

Minister of Citizenship, Winston Felix, under whose remit the GRO falls, had said during the 2015 Budget debates in August, that part of a $183M allocation to his department will go towards restoring GRO records. An additional part of the GPOC building has been rented to help in this restoration project. (GINA)