Megacities

“Megacity” is a term used for a city with more than 10 million inhabitants. There is estimated to be around 26 megacityes in the world in 10 years, seeing that they are developing this second. It wasn’t many years ago that the majority were living in rual areas, but in 2006, the first time ever in human history, there were more peple living in urban areas.

Megacities usually occur in developing countries, and of the 26 megacities that are guessed to be in 10 years, 22 of them will be in developing countries.

One of the graphs in the book shows that the biggest megacity in the world is Tokyo, Japan with 33.4 million inhabitants, followed by New York City, U.S.A. with 24.1. million and Mexico City, Mexico with 21.7 million. These statistics are from Population.data.net, and are from 2006. Nevertheless, new statistics from 2011, show that there has been a drastic change of the list of the 10 biggest megacities in the world. Tokyo is the still the biggest of them all, but the number of inhabitants is now 36.7 million, which is 6.3 million more people living in the same area, than when it were less people. New York City is no longer number two; New Dehli, India has taken over  with 22.2 million people. This means that New York City has less inhabitants in 2011 than in 2006, and has dropped to number six on the list. Now New York City only has 19.4 million inhabitants.

The list of the 10 largest megacities in the world in 2011:

1.Toyko, japan - 36,7 - 2011
2. Dehli, India - 22.2 - 2011 - 28.6 i 2025
3. Sao Paolo, Brazil - 20.3 - 2011
4. Mumbai, india - 20.0 - 2011 - 25.8 i 2025
5. Mexico City, Mexico - 19.7 - 2011
6. New York City, USA - 19.4 - 2011
7. Shanghai, China - 16.6 mill - 20 mill i 2025
8. Calcutta, India - 15.6 mill - 20.1 mill i 2025
9. Dhaka, Bangladesh - 14.6 - 20.9 mill i 2025
10. Karachi, Pakistan - 13,1 mill - 18,1 mill i 2025

Of all the megacities in the world, Dhaka in Bangladesh is the fastest growing. In 2006 it wasn’t even on the list of largest megacities, but I 2011 it made it’s way to a ninth place.  In 2025 it is supposed to have as many inhabitants as 20.9 million, which is an 6.3 million increase in 14 years. Other fast growing megacities are Mumbai with a supposed 25.8 million inhabitants in 2025, Shanghai with 20 million in 2025 and Calcutta with 20.1 million. India is definitely a country with a number of megacities under development. Dehli is already a large megacity, and both Mumbai and Calcutta are climbing their way up.

The urban population is consistently growing, and more rapidly every year, while the rual population however, is sinking. In Europe for instance, there was 209 million people in 1995 who were a part of the rural population, and only 518 million of the urban. In 2015 statistics estimate the number to be around 188 million of the real population, and 532 million of the urban. But this isn’t occurring only in Europe. Other parts of the word show the same statistics. Urban populations are too  increase rapidly the years to come.

It looks as if the world will be dominated by megacities and urban populations in the future. They are both growing very fast, and therefore we can ask ourselves if some day  it will be the end of all rural populations?