Madagascar’s last-mile civil registration strategy closing digital ID inclusion gap

Madagascar is achieving a foundational inclusion milestone with a growing number of digital ID enrollments, thanks in large part to a strategy that prioritizes last-mile civil registration in all parts of the country.

Already, more than 3.25 million people have been enrolled for the ID as authorities advance the implementation of the Digital Governance and Identification Management System Project (PRODIGY), executed partly with $143 million funding from the World Bank.

With a strong civil registration foundation, the country is successfully shifting the narrative from viewing birth registration as a mere bureaucratic formality to recognizing it as the first critical step in building digital public infrastructure (DPI) and protecting human rights.

Upon its launch in April, Malagasy authorities opted to move from a passive, facility-based registration that often misses rural and poor populations to a more proactive and community-driven enrollment approach using mobile technology.

Madagascar’s example is proof that offline-first and online-later identity registration models are critical for reaching the most marginalized people in a country.

A World Bank blog post highlights the successes of the Madagascar digital ID project, which was able to enroll more than two million people within just two months using Laxton gear thanks to this strategy.

Per the blog post, legal and digital identity registration faced a barrage of challenges for many years, preventing millions of people from accessing services in several critical domains such as social protection, education, finance, and healthcare. One citizen is quoted confessing that he had faced difficulties obtaining a digital ID card due to a lack of a birth certificate.

With civil registration reforms anchored in a legal framework that went operational in May, things have dramatically changed, as millions of citizens are now able to obtain an ID card and get easy access to government and private sector services. Legal frameworks are considered an important factor in driving DPI reforms. Nigeria recently had a new one to step up service delivery and digital trust momentum.

Madagascar’s early success notwithstanding, the World Bank believes there is a lot more work to do in order to make the most of the legal reform, given that achieving inclusion at scale goes beyond just the technology deployed.

“Reaching the millions who have lived outside the system for years will require sustained communication, local mobilization, and continued deployment of mobile teams to remote communities,” a portion of the blog post reads.

Meanwhile, last month, teams from the Malagasy government and the World Bank met to review progress on the PRODIGY and the Digital and Energy Connectivity for Inclusion in Madagascar (DECIM) projects, Ecofin Agency reports.

It was a moment to review different components of the initiatives and how they are contributing to the country’s overall digital transformation efforts. Both projects have total funding of $543 million.

Article Topics

biometrics  |  birth registration  |  civil registration  |  digital ID  |  digital inclusion  |  Laxton  |  Prodigy (Madagascar)