Birth registration
Without legal proof of identity, millions of children born today do not 'officially' exist.
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Nearly a quarter of the world’s children are living off the record: They have no legal proof of who they are, where they come from, or when they were born, simply because their births were never registered.
Without a birth certificate, children are invisible to their governments. They miss out on essential public services that help secure their most fundamental rights – like health care and schooling – and on social safety nets meant to reduce a child’s risk of exploitation and abuse.
As official proof of age, birth certificates help protect against child labour, child marriage and child trafficking, and ensure that children exposed to the justice system are not prosecuted as adults. As proof of nationality, they protect migrant and refugee children in search of asylum and help prevent them from being separated from their families while on the move.
The consequences for a child whose birth was never officially recorded follow her into adulthood. A birth certificate is required for basic but crucial transactions, like opening a bank account, registering to vote and entering the job market. Without one, children remain deprived of a legal identity, uncounted – and unaccounted for – by their governments.
What is birth registration?
Birth registration is the process of recording a child’s birth. It is a permanent and official record of a child’s existence and provides legal recognition of that child’s identity.
At a minimum, it establishes a government record of where a child is born and to whom. Birth registration is required to obtain a birth certificate – a child’s first legal proof of identity.
What is the difference between birth registration and a birth certificate?
Broadly speaking, birth registration is the process of officially logging a birth with a government authority, while a birth certificate is the paper issued by the state to the parent or caregiver as a result of this process. Birth certificates prove that registration has occurred.
Ideally, birth certificates follow every birth registration. However, because the process for issuing certificates varies by location, a child might be registered but never receive a birth certificate.
Why aren’t some children being registered at birth?
Numerous factors keep children from being registered. Most unregistered children live in poorer households – often in rural areas with limited access to registration services, or in the more than 100 countries without fully functioning civil registration systems. Cost is a significant barrier: Many families cannot afford to travel to registration sites or pay fees associated with registration, including fees for late registration.
In other cases, parents may be unaware of birth registration or may not understand how important it is.
Certain ethnic and religious minorities have lower birth registration rates than the national average. This may be because their culture places an emphasis on other customs – like naming ceremonies – or because they are marginalized, often living in remote areas or unrecognized by their governments.
And in a number of countries, women do not share the same rights as men, including when it comes to registering their children. Some are unable to register their children entirely, while others may do so only in the presence of the father.
How many children are not registered?
Birth registration is almost universal in most high-income countries. But in low- and middle-income countries, roughly one in five children under the age of 5 (150 million) are not registered. Of these children, half live in just five countries: Ethiopia (19 million), Pakistan (18 million), Nigeria (14 million), India (12 million) and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (12 million).
Even when children are registered, they may not have proof of registration. More than 50 million children under age 5 worldwide do not currently have a birth certificate.
What happens if a child is not registered?
Birth registration is the only legal way for a child to obtain a birth certificate.
This legal proof of identity unlocks essential public services, like health care, routine immunizations and education. It also helps protect children from abuse and exploitation.
In some places, children who are unable to prove their age are at greater risk of being forced into child marriage, child labour or recruitment by armed forces. They may become vulnerable to trafficking and illegal adoption. Children without birth certificates also face statelessness, meaning they do not have legal ties to any country.
In young adulthood, official identification is required for basic but critical transactions, like opening a bank account, registering to vote, receiving a passport, entering the job market, and buying or inheriting property. Economic opportunities are severely limited for those without a birth certificate – raising their risk of falling into, or remaining trapped in, poverty.
Why is birth registration crucial for governments and societies?
The benefits of birth registration go far beyond the child. Information collected from birth registration records helps governments plan where and how to spend money, and what areas to focus on for development programmes like education and immunization. Governments rely on accurate data to assess the needs of communities and make critical decisions about resource allocation – including those that affect the most vulnerable families.
Without information on who’s being left behind and why, social inequities risk becoming entrenched.
How is birth registration a gender equality issue?
In many parts of the world, women do not have the same rights as men to register their child’s birth. A mother may be turned away for not possessing identification or a marriage certificate, if the father is not present, or if she prefers not to list him on the birth form.
This makes survivors of rape and incest – cases in which a father may be unknown or refuse to acknowledge paternity – vulnerable to being denied registration services for their infants.
Lack of birth registration can also reinforce existing gender gaps in child rights. In places where girls already face barriers enrolling in school, for example, not having a birth certificate raises the hurdle. Without legal proof of age, young girls are also at much greater risk than boys of being forced into child marriage.
How can birth registration rates be improved?
Governments can take a number of actions to improve registration rates. Eliminating registration fees and late fees, or providing cash grants to parents who register their child, helps reduce the economic burden of registration for some families. Deploying mobile teams of trained registrars to remote areas can also allow governments to reach more vulnerable populations.
Technology offers other solutions. The Governments of Pakistan and Tanzania, for example, introduced smartphone apps for birth registration, allowing registrars to digitally collect and upload birth registration data to a protected, centralized system in real-time.
To ensure every child is recognized and protected, UNICEF is calling for five key actions:
- Register every child at birth as the foundation of a lifecycle approach to legal identity.
- Streamline registration processes to enhance service delivery and drive digital transformation.
- Leverage health, social protection and education programmes to boost birth registration.
- Implement key legal reforms for inclusive and equitable civil registration and vital statistics systems.
- Empower communities to demand civil registration services as a right.
What is UNICEF doing to help?
UNICEF has been a key global player in birth registration for over 35 years. Between 2021 and 2023, we worked with governments and communities to register nearly 144 million births and issue birth certificates to about 127 million children.
Our efforts focus on helping governments strengthen their civil registration systems. This includes increasing the number of service points where children can be registered, developing or updating birth registration policies, introducing innovations in registration technology, and increasing community awareness about birth registration.
We also partner with other sectors, like health, social protection and education, to integrate birth registration into their work. This includes increasing birth registration in hospitals and health centres, including it in immunization drives, and linking registration systems to national cash transfer systems and student databases.
The world has made substantial progress on birth registration in recent years. Today, around 77 per cent of children under 5 are registered, compared to 60 per cent in 2000. But more can be done to achieve universal birth registration by 2030. Read UNICEF’s recommendations here.