The Registrar General's Department (RGD) is reporting that it has collected and processed 150 applications from the Florida leg of its Overseas Outreach Programme to the United States, in November.

According to Chief Executive Officer of the RGD, Dr. Patricia Holness, this was due mainly to the increased awareness of civil registration matters and the demand for the Jamaican birth certificate brought on by the introduction of the U.S. passport regime.

She also explained that the fact that the U.S. Government requires that all individuals seeking to access immigration-related services, including citizenship, present a valid Jamaican birth certificate, might have led to the increase in applications.

While on their 13-day mobile outreach programme to the United States, the team visited Florida, Atlanta and the Tri-State area. The annual overseas outreach forms part of the agency's thrust to improve accessibility to its customers in the diaspora.

The team commenced the first leg of the outreach in Florida, where several town and church-hall meetings were held in Miami and Fort Lauderdale. Persons who attended these meetings were updated on the procedures necessary to secure and make adjustments to their civil registration records.

Members of the team also provided immediate search results from its online database, which has over six million indices. This provided customers with the entry number which is required to make applications and payments for birth and death certificates online.

"From the outreaches, we discovered that there was an emerging trend among Jamaicans who entered the United States in the 1970s. These individuals had certificates with just their first name and were facing challenges in obtaining their pensions and securing their citizenship," Dr. Holness pointed out.