At the Cities and Regions Forum held on February 24, 2022 in Nairobi, the capital of Kenya, urban areas were recognized by urban authorities across the African continent as drivers of environmental degradation, biodiversity loss, climate change and pollution. In the discussions between leaders, investors and members of organizations participating in the meeting, the focus […]
Professor Edgar Pieterse warns that unless cities are put on a more sustainable footing, this key source of human connectivity and innovation could well contribute to our demise. Have you ever walked around a city and marveled at the hustle and bustle? Cars and buses speed past, buildings tower over you, and advertising screams for […]
Professor Edgar Pieterse is founding director of the African Center for Cities (ACC) at the University of Cape Town and holder of the South African Research Chair in Urban Policy. Have you ever wandered around a city and marveled at the hustle and bustle? Cars and buses parade, buildings towering above you, and advertising screams […]
Tijs van den Brink thinks we should make cities smart rather than building new smart cities. COVID-19 has highlighted underlying vulnerabilities that undermine the quality of life of South African citizens. These include growing inequalities, limited and / or aging infrastructure and a lack of public resources to address these challenges, but the application of […]
September 16, 2020 • • AAfrica may not be the first continent that comes to mind when you think of smog-covered cities. But that could change if urban centers grow as fast as expected without sufficient pollution or traffic controls. According to the International Energy Agency. The process has already started. Researchers […]
The Thomson Reuters Foundation speaks with UN-Habitat Executive Director Maimunah Mohd Sharif about efforts to slow the spread of the virus in African cities The coronavirus is changing the world in unprecedented ways. Subscribe here for a daily briefing on how this global crisis is affecting cities, technology, approaches to climate change and the lives […]
By Laurie Goering, Thomson Reuters Foundation LONDON, April 3 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – The COVID-19 pandemic exposes the risks of leaving the growing ranks of African city dwellers crowding into slums without proper access to water, sewers, transport and sanitation. other utilities, have warned urban experts. Not a single African city today ranks in the […]
AAfrica is rural. Or that’s what senior Western officials mean when they talk about the continent. The top US diplomat for the region, Tibor Nagy, recently declared that Africa is “on the whole an agricultural society”. He is not alone: Germany’s recent Marshall Plan with Africa insists that “rural areas will determine Africa’s future”.It’s wrong. […]
African cities are experiencing devastating water shortages as their populations continue to grow. These water shortages have led to sanitation problems, which can contribute to the incidence of diseases such as cholera and typhoid fever. The African Development Bank estimated last year that it would take up to $ 66 billion to provide universal access […]
On Thursday, January 11, the Africa Growth Initiative at Brookings released its annual Foresight Africa report, highlighting six key priorities for the continent in 2018. In the second chapter of the report, Sustainable Finance for Economic Development: Mobilizing the resources of the Africa scholars discuss the urgency of boosting domestic resource mobilization in Africa, especially […]
Improved human well-being is one of the greatest triumphs of the modern era. The age of plenty has also led to an unexpected global health crisis: two billion people are overweight or obese. Developed countries have been particularly susceptible to unhealthy weight gain, a trend that could be seen as the price of abundance. However, […]
The Chronicle A woman walks through a market in Luanda, Angola. People who live in African cities depend heavily on the informal sector. – Reuters Sarah colenbranderCITIES in sub-Saharan Africa are growing rapidly. Nigeria alone is expected to add 212 million city dwellers by 2050, equivalent to the current population of Germany, France and the […]
EURACTIV.com spoke to Somik Vinaj Lall, lead author of the World Bank’s flagship report African cities: opening up to the world. Meeting with his EU counterparts, Lall identified areas where the EU’s experience could be of value in the urbanization of the African continent. The 162-page report finds that unlike other parts of the world, […]
The World Bank (WB) has reported that Africa’s urban population will double over the next 25 years, reaching 1 billion people by 2040. The report cites the population of the continent’s urban areas at 472 million and predicts that an additional 187 million people will be added to urban areas by 2025 to reach the […]
WASHINGTON, February 9, 2017“The population of African cities is growing – adding the size of another Nigeria to cities by 2025 – and therefore have a critical role to play in the economic growth of their countries, according to a new World Bank report released today” hui. Improving conditions for people and businesses in African […]