LAW, ORDER AND RECORDS
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Births and Deaths. The registration of births and deaths is compulsory under the Births and Deaths Registration Ordinance. Facilities for registration are provided at the General Register Office and ten District Registries on the Island, four in Kowloon and one at Tsuen Wan. In the outlying areas and islands, births are registered at Rural Committee Offices by District Registrars during regular visits, and deaths are registered at police stations.
During 1961 108,726 births (56,245 male and 52,481 female) were registered as compared with 110,667 (57,048 male and 53,619 female) in 1960. The birth rate per mille for the year was 34.2 as against 37.1 in 1960 and 36.6 in 1959.
In the New Territories facilities for the registration of births were not available until 1932, and those then provided were not fully used until recent years. The result is that many adults and older children in the New Territories do not possess birth certifi- cates. Since these are essential for many purposes including entry into schools and obtaining passports, there have been thousands of applications for the post-registration of births in the New Territories. To deal with these, three mobile post-registration teams have been operating in the New Territories throughout the year, and 4,013 births there were post-registered. In addition 845 births in the urban areas were post-registered during the year.
The number of deaths registered totalled 18,738 (10,294 male, 8,443 female, one unknown sex), as compared with 19,146 during the previous year. The death rate per mille for the year was 5.9 as against 6.4 in 1960 and 7.1 in 1959.
The Births and Deaths Registry compiles the vital statistics of the Colony. The Hollerith system is used for statistics of mortality, the information being recorded by means of punched cards.
Adoptions. An Adopted Children Register is maintained in which are registered adoption orders made by the Court under the Adoption Ordinance, 1956. One hundred and eighty four adop- tions were registered in 1961, 57 more than in 1960.