Your guide to legislative frameworks for Civil Registration and Vital Statistics
A strong legal framework is essential for a well-functioning Civil Registration and Vital Statistics (CRVS) system.
CRVSlaws.org provides easy access to countries’ CRVS laws with detailed analysis based on international practice and United Nations’ guidance and standards. Summary fact sheets of the analysis are available to download.
We focus on three thematic areas that cut across six key topics, allowing you to view comparative country practice for these three cross-cutting themes.
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Medicolegal Death Investigation
Medicolegal Death Investigation (MLDI) is the systematic, interdisciplinary process of determining the cause, manner, and circumstances of an unexplained, sudden, or unnatural death.
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Role of the Health Sector
Health providers play a critical role in the civil registration system, acting as informants or notifiers of the occurrence of births, stillbirths, and deaths that occur in health facilities or under the care of a medical professional.
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Women’s & Children’s Rights
Legal identity documentation enables women’s access to financial services, ownership of property, economic participation and protects them from exploitation including through forced or early marriages.
When everyone is counted, every one counts
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Our Purpose
CRVS Laws is a legal analysis tool that helps countries understand and evaluate the laws governing their Civil Registration and Vital Statistics systems across 150+ metrics and 200+ laws from countries worldwide. It serves as a resource for legal drafting, policy implementation, comparative research, and identifying gaps relative to UN standards. Ultimately, we support countries in building the case for legal reform.
Our database is built on legal reviews conducted in over 30 countries, using a standardized toolkit of more than 100 individual legal questions spanning six topics and three cross-cutting themes. Reviews are carried out by GHAI D4H lawyers working alongside in-country legal experts to ensure accurate, context-specific interpretation of each nation's legislative framework. Reviewers examine all publicly available CRVS legal instruments — from primary legislation to circulars and case law — and assess them against the UN Guidelines on Legislative Frameworks for CRVS Systems, WHO ICD-11, and other international standards.
