General Article The future of cities: what is the global agenda?

Topic Selected: Changing Population
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An extract from the report commissioned as part of the UK Government’s Foresight Future of Cities Project.

By Emily Moir, Tim Moonen and Greg Clark

What will the urbanised world of the future look like?

By 2050, it is expected that nearly 70% of the world’s population will live in urban areas. Recent reports by the UN anticipate some of the key differences between today’s urban world and that of 2050:

There will be more cities…

The UN recorded that there were 1,551 cities worldwide in 2010. By 2030, that number is expected to have surpassed 2,000, with continuing growth to 2050. Cities of all sizes are expected to continue to grow in number. For example, whilst there are 43 ‘large cities’ with populations between five and ten million in 2014, there are expected to be 63 by 2030.

...including more mega-cities.

The UN estimates that there will be more than 40 mega-cities worldwide by 2030, each with a population of at least ten million, compared to 28 today. It is thought that Delhi, ...

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