b) Removing barriers to birth registration and certification Over the last 15 years, several countries have revised discriminatory laws and taken other steps to increase birth registration rates and make it easier to obtain birth certificates. For example, in 2006, acting on the recommendations of the CEDAW Committee,111 Nepal amended the discriminatory provisions between women and men. Before these reforms, notice of a birth was given by the head of household and, in his absence, by the eldest male member of the family. Now, women as well as men can be designated head of household, and the eldest male member no longer provides the birth declaration if the head of household is absent.112 In Mozambique, the 2004 reform of the Civil Registration Code allowed either parent to register the birth and obtain a birth certificate.113 Single mothers are now free to register their children under their maiden name,114 and a woman may choose to register her child as having a father other than her husband.115 Free universal registration is considered the international norm (UNICEF 2013) as fees and fines risk further marginalizing the poor and most frequently excluded, including women. Evidence from Tanzania, Ghana, and Brazil suggests that the removal of registration fees acted simultaneously to eliminate a disincentive and create a positive incentive for registration (World Bank 2016b). Birth registration initiatives often eliminate or substantially reduce these costs. Tanzania and Ghana significantly extended the period of free registration; Brazil mandated that registration be free for everyone (Fagernäs and Odame 2013; Hunter and Sugiyama 2017; UNICEF 2013); and Angola made birth registration and the issuance of birth certificates free for all children under the age of 5 in 2007116 and subsequent legislation in 2013 and 2015 provides free birth registration and free issuance of birth certificates.117 However, in Angola, only the issuance of the first birth certificate, provided upon registration, is free. Birth certificates expire after one year from issuance, and requests for reissuance carry a fee.118 Angola is not the only one: fines and increased fees are still used to incentivize prompt birth registration in several countries. In Belize, if a child is not registered within 42 days of birth, the parents must pay a fine for late registration and can be summoned to register the birth within one year.119 In Kenya, birth registration is free if it is done within six months, and a fee for late registration is imposed after that. Other countries that charge a fee for registering births after the required deadline include Angola, El Salvador, Ghana, Jamaica, Lesotho, Sri Lanka, Tajikistan, and Vietnam (World Bank 2018a). The link between poverty and low rates of birth registration is well established (UNICEF 2017b), and cash transfers, cash grants, and noncontributory pension programs are proving to be promising methods of promoting birth registration. Zimbabwe and India have recently implemented Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) programs that mandate birth registration as a condition to receive the cash transfer. The CCT program in Zimbabwe resulted in a 16.4 percent increase in the registration rate of the beneficiaries’ children ages 0–4 and in a 15 percent increase in the registration rate of school-age children. The Indian CCT program successfully improved registration of female children by 15 percent. In Brazil, many parents have obtained birth certificates as these were necessary to receive the Bolsa Família CCT. Because of the program, the percentage of unregistered births dropped from 27.1 percent in 1998 to 6.7 percent in 2012 (World Bank 2016b). To address other aspects of gender inequality that put women at a disadvantage, such as distance to registration facilities and constraints to traveling, many countries are introducing new systems to register births and obtain birth certificates, including web-based applications and the use of mobile technologies. For example, Bangladesh has introduced an online Birth Registration Information System, which allows registering births and obtaining birth certificates through an online application. All records are then stored in an online database, thus reducing delays, errors, and inconsistencies inevitably caused by the former manual registration process (UNICEF 2013).120 In Burkina Faso, a mobile system that allows births to be registered remotely is making registration more accessible, especially to rural people. The iCivil system creates a digital birth certificate using a mobile application and a bracelet with a unique code, which midwives attach to the baby’s wrist. The code with the baby’s details is scanned using the app and sent III. Removing gender-based legal barriers against women to identification 19