Arab cities to remain world’s most affluent in 2017

Two cities in the Middle East are contributing to the world’s growing urban population according to the Global Economies and Consumers in 2017 report released by Euromonitor International.

The world’s urban population is growing at two per cent annually, however some cities in the Middle East and Africa are exceeding the growth rate by a wide margin. Doha in Qatar is set to grow at a three per cent rate and the population of metropolitan Cairo in Egypt is forecast to grow by 0.5 million in just 2017.

The global urban population will reach 4.1 billion in 2017 from 3.3 billion in 2007 with the majority of this growth again coming from the Middle East, Africa and the Asia Pacific, where the urban population growth rate is set to reach nearly 70 per cent combined.

According to the report, the median age of the population in Western Europe is set to reach 41.1 years which will be more than double that of Africa and the Middle East in 2017.

Middle Eastern metropolises will remain the world’s most affluent hubs with Dubai seeing a particularly high growth of high-income households.