THE Child Development Agency (CDA) and the Office of the Children’s Registry (OCR) have now merged and will now be called the Child Protection and Family Services Agency (CPFSA), minister of state in the Ministry of Education, Youth and Information, Floyd Green announced yesterday.

The CDA is mandated to provide care and protection for children at risk, while the OCR is to receive and record, assess and refer all cases of child abuse, to which was added in 2013 the Ananda Alert programme dealing with missing children. After receiving these reports, the Child Development Agency (CDA) and the Office of the Children’s Advocate (OCA) follow up for investigation and action.

A ministry release said the merger has come about to create a more efficient child protection sector with emphasis on pooling of resources, timeliness, and eventual increase in staff complement in the field services division.

“The name change to the Child Protection and Family Services Agency (CPFSA) reflects the oversight committee’s strong consensus reflection after multiple civil society consultations supported by the Ministry of Education, Youth and Information on the mandate of the expanded organisation and the opportunity for even further leveraging of its new mandate going forward,” the release said.

Head of the oversight committee, Michael McAnuff Jones, said the merger underlines Prime Minister Andrew Holness’s perspective that “Family is the ultimate partnership”.

A press briefing will be held next week to outline phases of the merger.