Bangladesh must urgently modernise its Birth and Death Registration Act and make registration mandatory at health facilities to safeguard citizens’ rights and strengthen public health planning, speakers said at a journalists’ workshop in the capital.
The two-day workshop, titled “Birth and Death Registration in Bangladesh: Progress, Challenges and Way Forward,” was held on March 3–4 at the Bangladesh Medical Association (BMA) Bhaban. It was organized by PROGGA (Knowledge for Progress) with support from the Global Health Advocacy Incubator. A total of 32 journalists from print, television and online media participated.
Speakers noted that Bangladesh’s birth registration rate currently stands at 50 percent, while the death registration rate is 47 percent, leaving nearly half of all life events unrecorded in official systems.
Experts warned that the absence of universal civil registration undermines legal identity and restricts access to essential services, including education, healthcare, inheritance, voting rights and social protection. Unregistered individuals are more vulnerable to child labour, child marriage, trafficking and discrimination. Weak civil registration data also hampers evidence-based policymaking and effective development planning, they added.
Under the existing law, families bear primary responsibility for registering births and deaths, while health facilities are not legally obligated to ensure registration. However, nearly two-thirds of births in Bangladesh now take place in healthcare facilities, creating what speakers described as a critical opportunity to institutionalise facility-based registration.
Participants cited examples from Maldives, Bhutan and Sri Lanka, which have achieved near-universal registration through mandatory facility-based systems.
Md. Nazrul Islam, Country Coordinator of Vital Strategies, said legal reform must be accompanied by effective implementation to achieve universal coverage.
Muhammad Ruhul Quddus, Bangladesh Country Lead, Global Health Advocacy Incubator (GHAI), said assigning registration responsibility to healthcare facilities would help Bangladesh meet its commitments under targets set by the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific and Sustainable Development Goal 16.9, which calls for legal identity for all.
Sajjadur Rahman, Deputy Editor of The Business Standard, urged media outlets to maintain sustained coverage to keep reform efforts high on the national agenda.
ABM Zubair, Executive Director of PROGGA, also addressed the event. Meanwhile, Md. Hasan Shahriar and Mashiat Abedin presented the key findings of the study along with a set of policy recommendations.