How Africa will become the center of the world’s urban future
By Max Bearak, Dylan Moriarty and Júlia Ledur
Nov. 19, 2021
Growing at unprecedented rates, and shaped by forces both familiar and new, dozens of African cities will join the ranks of humanity’s biggest megalopolises between now and 2100.
Several recent studies project that by the end of this century, Africa will be the only continent experiencing population growth. Thirteen of the world’s 20 biggest urban areas will be in Africa — up from just two today — as will more than a third of the world’s population.
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Researchers created three population models to account for different paths of development African countries might take this century, and in all of them, African cities outpaced the rest of the world’s cities in growth.
They found that changes in government policies,education levels, access to contraception, movements for women’s equalityand the severity of climate change had significant effects on the birthrates driving population growth, but not enough to keep most major African cities from growing faster than cities on other continents.
