Environment and Natural Resources

Like elsewhere, human settlements in Africa are the result of numerous interactions between the natural environment and societies. It is no coincidence that the most urbanized parts of the continent are in the coastal areas of North and West Africa, the Nile valley, Ethiopia and, in Southern Africa, along the coast between Cape Town and Maputo. Major factors underlying this reality are the geography and natural resources. For the seven case study cities, the settlements developed as a result of a combination of geological, topographical, hydrologic and climatic factors.

For example, the history of Johannesburg is inextricably linked to the geological formations known as the Witwatersrand Basin, while Khartoum owes to its position on the confluence of the Blue Nile and White Nilek, and Dar es Salam owes its growth and development to climatic conditions.

7.2 Demography

7.2.1 Precolonial Africa had cities but …

Precolonial Africa had major agglomerations that can be described as cities. Monomotapa in present-day Zimbabwe, Mapungubwe, Thulamela, Axum in Ethiopia, Timbuctoo and Djenné in Mali are a few that have become well known. The history of Kinshasa is testament to the fact that Africa had cities and shopping centres, Until 1880, Kinshasa was an important commercial centre where local people traded slaves for local needs, wild meats, potteries, raphia, tobacco, boats, crafts, tools, and bought weapons, clothes, alcohol, foods, ivory etc.¹² However, although cities existed in precolonial Africa, the ones in this sample, i.e. the ones that are witnessing the fastest growth today, are not precolonial cities. Precolonial cities declined and lost their importance before or during the colonial era. The current cities are either colonial creations or cities that grew during the colonial era. This means that they are linked to a rapacious political economy, which takes many forms throughout history.

7.2.2 the urban explosion is recent

In 1950, the African continent had only 20 million urban dwellers; today it has more than 400 million. More than any other city, Lagos symbolises this rapid urban growth. Lagos has grown from a population of about 300 000 in 1950 to a megacity of over 10 million today. While estimates of Lagos population often differ, recent figures indicate that the urban areas of Lagos are currently home to more than 12 million people and are expected to exceed 24 million people by 2030. Like Lago, in less than a century Dar es Salam has transformed from a small fishing village to a wealthy metropolis of more than four million inhabitants. Its population is growing at a rate of 5.6% per year and will rise to about 5.2 million inhabitants by 2020.¹³ Between 1925 and 1957 (just before independence) the region’s population grew from 30 000 to 129 000 inhabitants. Between 2005 and 2012, the population grew significantly, from 2 456 100 to 4 364 541 inhabitants. With an average density of 3 133 people per square kilometre in 2012, the region of Dar es Salam is the most densely populated part of continental Tanzania.¹⁴ Dakar has a similar story. Senegal’s urbanization rate grew from 25% in 1961 to 39% in 1988. Today, after the last wave of demarcation in 1990, when 12 new city councils were created and are now regarded as towns, Senegal’s urbanization level has reached 50%, according to all estimates, i.e. around six million urban dwellers. Almost half (49.6%) of this urban population is based in the Greater Dakar area, which is home to more than three million people.

7.2.3 This urban explosion received several boosts

The first one occurred with the arrival of colonisation

Thanks to its strategic position, during colonisation the city of Dakar benefited from structural investments and migratory flows, even from outside Senegal. Therefore, the absorption of people from other areas started a long time ago, reinforcing the city’s power.

The second occurred immediately after independence

Dakar’s growth exploded just before independence and accelerated after independence. Dakar’s share of the total population increased steadily, from 14.3% in 1961 to 17.7% in 1971, and then to 18.8% in 1976 and 21.6 % in 1988. In Cairo, the urban explosion started between 1952 and 1956, during the first years of Nasser’s regime. Khartoum’s burst of rapid growth happened around 1956, just after the country’s independence, while Dar es Salam’s urban explosion started around 1961, when Tanganyika gained independence. In 1964 Tanganyika and Zanzibar merged to form Tanzania, and Dar es Salam remained the country’s capital.

The third boost came during the 1980s and 1990s

Despite Dakar’s population growth falling from 9% (1955–1961) to 4% (1976–1988), the city remains the main reception area for about a third of the country’s internal migrants. Khartoum is home to 21%

of Sudan’s population, having seen its population rise from 245 000 inhabitants in 1956 to 7 million inhabitants in 2015.

7.2.4 This urban explosion is due to several factors

Push factors, including technical factors (e.g. the mechanization of agriculture in Sudan), climatic events (e.g. the 1980s drought in Sudan and Senegal and in the Sahel belt), political factors (populations displaced as a result of e.g. tribal/civil wars in Sudan and the ending of pass laws and arrival of democracy in South Africa), and economic factors (e.g. in Senegal, the structural adjustment programmes implemented during the 1980s and 1990s that led to the elimination of subsidies to family agriculture, causing “peasant unrest”).

Pull factors, including the opportunities created in urban areas. This was the case in Sudan, with the discovery of oil in the 1990s and its extraction after 1998. The urban landscape changed rapidly, as from 2008 Khartoum became the country’s economic engine, home to 75% of manufacturing industries and 85% of service businesses in Sudan. The same thing happened in Dakar and Dar es Salam, where the populations of the hinterlands are attracted by the non-agricultural employment opportunities in cities.

The youth bulge/age pyramid. In Khartoum, the youth (15–29 years) made up a third of the population in 2008 and is set to rise to 2.5 million inhabitants by 2018, which is a 42% increase over 10 years. No doubt the cities in our case studies will experience similar trends. In any event, this young urban population, which is clearly visible in all the cities, is undoubtedly a great opportunity.

However, this age structure (population pyramid), in which more than half the urban population is economically inactive, results in a very high level of dependency, which makes public and private saving very difficult.

A changing racial composition: Johannesburg is a good example of this. In 1911, Whites dominated in the city (50.6%), followed by Blacks (43%) and then, far behind, were Coloureds (mixed race) and Indians, which together made up 6% of the population. By 1996 the landscape had

changed dramatically, with Blacks making up 70.2% of the population, followed by Whites (18.7%) and Asians and Coloureds (10.2%). However, the change in the racial composition did not result in a similar change in the economic weight of different racial groups; with the advent of democracy in 1994, political power was transferred to the Black majority, but economic power was still largely held by White capital.¹⁵ While not as spectacular as in Johannesburg, other cities have seen significant changes in their racial composition, with a marked downward trend in the foreign population around independence and a domination of national/local populations.