In a letter in our Wednesday edition, Mr Raymond Chickrie put forward a case for digitizing the immigration and other records of our various categories of citizens, as has been done in Suriname. For those with Surinamese ancestral connections, he gave the URL for various sites with documents on the Chinese, Javanese and Indians; certain categories of slaves, plantations and their owners; and manumittees between the years 1832-1863. He wrote that it was not the government in Suriname which accomplished this feat, but citizens from all walks of life. Where the period of slavery is concerned, he asked whether similar information was available in this country.

The first thing that has to be said in relation to Guyana is that there are huge lacunae in the local records, particularly in relation to the era of slavery. The most comprehensive sequences of documents (and even these are not complete) for the first two hundred years of this country's history are located not in Guyana, but in the Public Record Office (PRO) in London, and in the Rijksarchief in the Hague. Some records are duplicated in both repositories, but most are not.

Many of the major international archival institutions are responding to the digital era, and the PRO is no exception. As the central repository for the records of a former imperial power, its holdings are vast, but it has been in the process of putting its catalogue on-line, which will aid researchers in identifying classes of documents which could be of interest to them, and it has also placed some categories of records relating to immigrants in the UK on-line too.

It has to be said, however, that in chronological terms the experience of slavery in this country was primarily a Dutch experience, and the records relevant to the period, therefore, are mostly in the Dutch language. This fact has proved an impediment even to professional researchers whose first language is English, and is likely to represent a similar disincentive to the majority of Guyanese private individuals pursuing their ancestral roots - although that in itself is not an argument against digitizing the surviving local records.

It should be observed too, that the seventeenth and eighteenth-century documents are mostly in manuscript, and are often difficult to read, even in those circumstances where the state of preservation of the paper is reasonably good. There are some Dutch governors and officials of this country whose handwriting and syntax represent a challenge even to the most experienced native Dutch historians.

The immigration records have fewer problems, linguistically and otherwise, although that does not mean that they are necessarily in a pristine state of preservation. Where the general public is concerned, their major interest lies in the fact that they make it possible to trace individual forebears, something which is much more difficult with records from the slavery period. Certainly for the era of British slavery it is easier than for the Dutch, although even then a great deal of ferreting is usually required, not always involving public documents exclusively. There is unfortunately no guarantee, however, that for these early periods intensive searching will turn up anything helpful.

From around the middle of the nineteenth century, there are the census records, complete sequences of which are held in the PRO, and incomplete ones locally. In addition, it should also be noted that the registration of births, deaths and marriages became a requirement in the nineteenth century too. These records, however, are not deposited in the Guyana National Archives, but in the Office of the Registrar General, which falls under the auspices of the Ministry of Home Affairs, not the Ministry of Culture. Its registration records date back to 1865, while it also is a repository for some, although not all, of the shipping records. For some time now it has been facilitating members of the public on Fridays who wish to trace their own family members.

The push to put records on-line has come about partly from the massive explosion of public interest in genealogical research. In our own case, where the records have been subject to depredations caused by the climate, insects and vandalism over the years, one hardly would advocate them being perused by armies of amateur genealogists. It makes sense, therefore, for the authorities to entertain projects which would allow digital access to those classes of records which would provide information to people searching for their roots.

This applies particularly to the information stored in the General Registrar's office. In other countries, registries made money from undertaking genealogical research for private citizens long before cyberspace ever entered the picture. Now many of them have put their data on-line, which can be accessed by the general public - for a fee, of course. There is no reason why that could not be done here, which would allow the office, if not to become self-financing, then at least to recover some expenses and perhaps provide resources for the conservation of original documents.