Dr Daniela Cristina Stefan talks to ecancer at the 2013 AORTIC meeting in South Africa about the urgent need to improve the registration of cancer in children in Africa. Registries, rather, provide information that is vital to plan the services of paediatric oncology units and the collected information has the potential to assist scientific analysis, planning and research. An estimated number of new childhood cancer cases is between 46,000 and 57,000 a year, on the African continent.