Rapidly urbanising Africa to have six cities with populations above 10m by 2035

Six African cities will have more than 10 million people by 2035, with the continent’s booming young population making it the world’s fastest urbanising region, according to a report.

Angola’s capital, Luanda, and Tanzania’s commercial hub, Dar es Salaam, will join the metropolises of Cairo, Kinshasa, Lagos and Greater Johannesburg with populations of more than 10 million, the Economist Intelligence Unit said in a report on African cities.

Africa’s youthful, growing cities are seen as a boundless source of creativity and innovation, but many have also been the focus of waves of protests this year amid corruption, tax rises, a lack of jobs and political classes that are more often than not regarded as out of touch.

This fast-paced urbanisation, which will result in more than half of Africans living in towns and cities by 2035, is expected to create wealth, dynamism and business opportunities, the report says.

But, it adds: “Overcrowding, informal settlements, high unemployment, poor public services, stretched utility services and exposure to climate change are just some of the major challenges that city planners will have to grapple with.”

By 2035, on top of the six megacities, the continent will have 17 urban areas with more than 5 million people and about another 100 with more than 1 million.

Of the 100 largest cities by 2035, Addis Ababa is expected to grow at an average annual rate of 10.6%, followed by Kampala, Dar es Salaam and Abidjan at above or near 9%.

The continent’s urban population is forecast to reach almost 1 billion by 2035, up from about 650 million last year. East Africa is expected to be the region with the fastest growing urban population, followed by central Africa and west Africa.

The EIU said “megalopolises in the making” include a 370-mile (600km) stretch of west Africa’s coast from Abidjan, in Ivory Coast, east through Ghana, Togo and Benin to Lagos, in Nigeria, which “could become one of the world’s largest urban corridors by 2035”, with more than 50 million people.

Other potential megalopolises it identified centre on Cairo and Alexandria, in Egypt; Johannesburg and Pretoria, in South Africa; a “Great Lakes city hub” encompassing Nairobi, in Kenya, and Kampala, in Uganda; and clusters in Morocco and Algeria.

The UN estimates that Africa’s population will almost double in the next 30 years, to 2.2 billion. About 70% of the population is under the age of 30.