UNITED NATIONS: Half of the global population will live in cities by the end of this year for the first time in human history while the percentage of urbanised in India will only be 29%, latest projections by the United Nations show. The report predicts that the number of people living in urban areas would rise to 70% by 2050.
Currently, 3.3 billion people of estimated population of 6.4 billion are living in urban areas and their number would double to 6.4 billion by 2050 when some 9.2 billion people are expected to inhabit the Earth, the report said. But the United Nations says that there is nothing to worry about it as urbanisation shows the dynamism of the economies and rich societies are among the highly urbanised.
The report released on Tuesday said that even then India would still be not as urbanised as China where currently 40% people live in cities and their number is projected to go up to 70% or one billion people by 2050.
Releasing latest projections on urbanisation, director of Department of Economic and Social Affairs' Population Division, Hania Zlotnik, stressed that the migration to urban areas would continue in India despite attempts by the Indian planners to prevent people from moving to cities.
Indian planners, she said, should be trying to foster economic dynamism in rural areas where 70% of the population lives and rural development implies improving agriculture and establishment of agro industries. That would mean fewer people would be needed in that sector which, in turn, would require excess labour to be moved to non farm employment which is available mostly in cities. Zlotnik outlined two scenarios: either people would migrate to cities such as Mumbai, or one-time rural areas would transition into urban centres by generating other activities.
That process had been seen in China, and would need to happen in India. Moreover, if those areas became more dynamic, people would earn more, become more educated, and demand better services, as had been the case in Europe, the US and Latin America, she added. Zlotnik explained that greatest expansion could happen not in metropolises but in cities which have population less than 500,000 and even some of the rural area graduate into urban area.
In India, she said, two new megacities — Kolkota and Chennai — which are projected to have populations of 26.6 million and 10.1 million respectively would join Mumbai and Delhi by 2025. Mumbai had a population of 19 million and Delhi 18.8 million last year.
Worldwide, the UN expects addition of 8 new megacities with population of 10 million or more by 2025. These would include Shenzhen in China which will become third megacity in the country after Beijing and Shanghai. However, Tokyo will remain largest megacity. Its population of 35.7 million at the last count is expected to rise to 36.4 million by 2025.