<P> Vital statistics are statistics on live births, deaths, fetal deaths, marriages and divorces . The most common way of collecting information on these events is through civil registration, an administrative system used by governments to record vital events which occur in their populations (see Box 1). Efforts to improve the quality of vital statistics will therefore be closely related to the development of civil registration systems in countries . </P> <P> Box 1 . United Nations Definitions of Vital Statistics and Civil Registration Systems A vital statistics system is defined by the United Nations "as the total process of (a) collecting information by civil registration or enumeration on the frequency or occurrence of specified and defined vital events, as well as relevant characteristics of the events themselves and the person or persons concerned, and (b) compiling, processing, analyzing, evaluating, presenting, and disseminating these data in statistical form" (UN, 2001). Civil registration, as defined by the United Nations, is the" continuous, permanent, compulsory, and universal recording of the occurrence and characteristics of vital events (livebirths, deaths, fetal deaths, marriages, and divorces) and other civil status events pertaining to the population as provided by decree, law or regulation, in accordance with the legal requirements in each country ." </P>

When did the first collection of a set of data pertaining to populations occur