(Newsletter March 2023)

A new Community of Practice on measuring adult mortality was launched as part of the 54th UNSC side event on “Measuring coverage of death registration: innovative approaches with surveys and censuses”.  

The community of practice is established in response to requests from an Expert Group Meeting on Innovative Methods to Measure the Impact of COVID-19 on Mortality through Surveys and Censuses organised in August 2022 by UN-DESA Statistics Division, in collaboration with the DESA Population Division and New York University Abu Dhabi. The meeting was organised under the guidance of the WHO-DESA Technical Advisory Group on COVID-19 Mortality Assessment (TAG). The virtual space will offer experts, NSO’s, relevant ministries and other partners an opportunity to share knowledge and experiences through peer-to-peer exchanges and learning in collecting/analyzing adult mortality data through household surveys, censuses, and integrated data for countries without reliable CRVS systems. Together, community members will also identify areas requiring further methodological development including testing and piloting; and developing guidelines. To join the community, please write to escap-crvs@un.org

The side event, measuring coverage of death registration: innovative approaches with surveys and censuses, was organized by the UN Statistics Division, NYU Abu Dhabi and UNESCAP Statistics Division. Speakers included the organisers as well as country representatives from Lao PDR, Colombia, India as well as Bloomberg Philanthropies. The country presentation from Lao PDR focused on the CRVS inequality assessment work, which was a collaboration between Lao Statistics Bureau, UNESCAP, UNFPA and the Ministry of Home Affairs (MoHA). The Colombia presentation highlighted how the recent census included an additional question to measure both birth and death registration completeness, and innovative strategies to improve completeness and coverage of vital events. The India presentation highlighted how the country’s death registration disparity is by administrative units and socio-economic characteristics.

The concept note and presentations from the event are available here.

During the Statistical Commission (28 February – 3 March 2023), CRVS was in focus during agenda item 5(a) which was supported by the report of the Secretary-General on demographic statistics. The report presents activities carried out by the Statistics Division in this area, including information on the implementation of the United Nations Legal Identity Agenda.