IN light of the government’s ongoing utilisation of advancing technology, the General Register Office (GRO) of Guyana, under the Ministry of Home Affairs, is preparing to digitise all certificates issued by the agency.

Despite the agency already having a database for specific documents, it is currently in the process of digitising marriage and death certificates.

During a press conference on Wednesday at the ministry, Minister of Home Affairs, Robeson Benn, said that this move will allow the information of citizens to be more secured.

“I think fundamentally the basic interest of the government and by extension the ministry is to have a more efficient process, one that is more responsive to the needs of our citizens and to ensure that we do not have situations where people make repeated attempts to get certain documents,” the minister stated.

He said with one transaction, every information needed on a citizen will be available, instead of them having to run-around to the agency more than once.

Furthermore, Raymon Cummings, Registrar General of the GRO, emphasised that any information stored in the agency’s database regarding an individual will remain unchanged indefinitely.
This, he said, decreases the chance of persons making multiple mistakes.

“The documents are scanned and a database with all the information is created…So, it removes that chance of error when persons [are] writing. In terms of technology, we have secured printers. The security feature on the certificate that is known by the person who is required to know them will be printed on the printer at the time when the certificate is printed. So, your document will be printed on a printer from the database,” Cummings explained.

The Registrar General further noted that, as the agency moves forward to do this with the marriage and death certificates, it is in the process of cross-checking to make sure that information on the database is correct.

Meanwhile, Deputy Registrar General, Visham Budhoo, stressed the importance of Guyana becoming technological savvy in these modern times.

“Those certificates will be more secure as it will have more security features. We also would not like to be left behind. We want to move to technology as the world is going that direction,” Budhoo posited.

In addition to its technological advancements, this initiative will streamline documentation processes and promote continuous organisational efficiency within the agency.