Chapter 6 BURKINA FASO. Ngolo Silué (left) sits with his family in the village of Olleo. Thanks to the support of Côte d’Ivoire Women’s Legal Aid Association, the Silué family, all formerly undocumented and at risk of statelessness, have started the process of obtaining identity papers that not only prove their nationality but will help them apply for jobs, access state healthcare and get driver’s licences. © UNHCR/MARK HENLEY Recognizing the problem: Better statistics on statelessness In line with SDG 1772 and Target 17.18,73 increasing the availability of high-quality, reliable and disaggregated data is critical in any effort to impact development. Identifying stateless people is the first step towards addressing the difficulties they face, as well as enabling governments, UNHCR and others to prevent 72 SDG 17. Strengthen the means of implementation and revitalize the global partnership for sustainable development. 73 Target 17.18: By 2020, enhance capacity-building support to developing countries, including for least developed countries and small island developing States, to increase significantly the availability of high-quality, timely and reliable data disaggregated by income, gender, age, race, ethnicity, migratory status, disability, geographic location and other characteristics relevant in national contexts. 62 and reduce statelessness. Recognition of statelessness and gathering data about the problem are key elements in UNHCR’s Global Action Plan to End Statelessness (Global Action Plan), which accompanies the #IBelong Campaign. To improve quantitative and qualitative data on stateless populations, UNHCR works with States to undertake targeted surveys and studies and to incorporate questions allowing for the identification of stateless persons in population and housing censuses. The Global Action Plan also calls for the strengthening of civil registration and vital statistics systems and UNHCR works with others to provide technical support to this end. Many countries have made strong commitments to address and end statelessness. Over 350 pledges were made to address statelessness at the High-Level Segment on Statelessness, held in October 2019 to mark the midpoint of the UNHCR > GLOBAL TRENDS 2019