“A workshop to develop "vital statistics" is organized by the Statistical Office of the United Nations in collaboration with the United Nations Statistics Division and ESCWA

20 Arab Countries Discuss the Development of Vital Statistics to Secure Population Data, Improve Governance, Protect Rights, and Ensure Data Accessibility to Achieve Development. February the 14th 2017, the proceedings of the international workshop on the principles and recommendations to develop the Vital Statistics System (version 3) for Arab speaking countries started in the headquarters of the GCC-Stat in the Omani Capital, Muscat. The workshop, which lasted for four days 14-17 February 2017 is hosted and partially organized by the GCC-Stat in collaboration with the United Nations Statistics Division and the Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA). Twenty Arab countries participated in the workshop, in addition to the Statistical Center of the Gulf Cooperation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf (GCC-Stat), the United Nations Statistics Division and the Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA). The workshop will focus on speeding up the process of improving civil registration and vital statistics, as vital statistics play a key role in providing the demographic data necessary for the development process, and the statistics required for health planning and evaluation, in addition to securing rights and gaining access to services, and improving governance through identity data. The workshop aimed to increase the knowledge of statisticians and government civil registration staff of the revised international principles and recommendations related to the compilation, processing and dissemination of vital statistics, and to improve the competencies of the participants to identify the gaps and challenges related to the adoption of the international standards to improve the vital statistics system in their countries. Vital statistics are considered a compilation of statistics on vital facts in a person's life, in addition to the key characteristics for the person himself/herself or to a group of people, like the statistics of “Live Births, Natural Deaths, Criminal Deaths, Marriage, Divorce, Declaration of Nullity of Marriage” in each country. Vital statistics also include legal separation, adoption, legalization and legal admission statistics. Vital statistics provide essential and highly important information about the population. During the workshop, and in the context of the GCC Statistical Agenda, the GCC-Stat gave a power point presentation. The presentation is based on five aspects; the first aspect gives an overview of the GCC-Stat, the second tackles vital statistics in the GCC countries: “Figures and Indicators”, the third aspect deals with the availability of vital statistics in the Arab Gulf region, the fourth highlights the difficulties and challenges that face the GCC-Stat to measure the indicators, and the final part of the presentation explains how to obtain vital data.