What does urbanisation bring us? This is a big question, the Chairman of the Organising Committee of the Kazakhstan Growth Forum, Eldar Abdrazakov, said during a speech. But it is obvious that the population of Kazakhstan will exceed 20 million people by 2030.
“Already today, 50% of the world's population lives in cities. At the same time, 55% of the gross domestic product is formed in large cities of more than 500 thousand people. It is estimated that 60% of economic growth will be generated by large cities and by 2050, 70% of people will live in cities,” the speaker said.
According to Eldar Abdrazakov, urbanisation is an irreversible trend. As an example, the speaker cited our closest neighbour, China, where over the past 40 years the level of urbanisation has increased from 27% to 57%. This is an increase by 600 million people. That is, over the past 40 years, 600 million people have moved from rural areas to the city. Another 100 million will become urban residents by 2020.
“At the same time, China is very systematically developing infrastructure for big cities. Cities with more than 200 thousand people will be connected by a single railway network. Major cities over 500 thousand will be connected by high-speed trains. Unfortunately, this is what we do not see here. At the same time, cities retain their historical uniqueness. Everyone has their own character. Today, Chinese cities are moving away from the Soviet principle of neighbourhoods. Greater priorities are placed on landscaping and open infrastructure. The fact that fences are demolished in Almaty has been demolished in China for a long time,” the speaker said.
By the quality of life, Almaty is ranked 177th among 231 cities. In the ranking, the city is located between Tirana (Albania) and Tair (Egypt).
“What does urbanisation give us? We say that the future is there. There are both positive and negative sides. We are waiting for an increase in productivity, when the city doubles, its productivity increases by 15%. This is due to the fact that we are beginning to share more information. Urbanisation gives a great opportunity to choose,” Eldar Abdrazakov states.
Almaty has long overgrown the boundaries of the city. Megapolis must develop in accordance with its status. But there are also disadvantages. A large crowd of people entails complications and conflicts. Cost of living rises.
“There are two models of urbanisation. There are manufacturing cities that, with increasing numbers, begin to produce with greater efficiency and productivity. There are cities consumers or parasites. These are those cities where an increase in population does not entail an increase in productivity or talent,” the committee chairman said. "And most of what we see in Kazakhstan are the cities-consumers. We have three million-cities: Almaty, Astana, Shymkent. These are three different models of urbanisation. Each of them will develop in its own direction. We would like us to more realistically assess the possibilities of cities, expect an index of the cost of living in them. Today it is very difficult to live on the cost of living in Kazakhstan. It does not include most of the costs.”
According to the head of the centre of competitiveness of Astana ISC, Anuar Buranbayev, urbanisation is just one of the trends that cannot be avoided. This is neither good, nor bad.
“We need to understand how to live with it. There are many opinions. The republics of Central Asia after independence in 1991 were among the few in the world where the process of urbanisation began. From 1991 to 2017, we lost about 4 million people, with a total of 16 million. People were leaving cities. In 2008, there was a negative rate of urbanisation. After the break occurred, we began to grow. People come to the cities for a good life. We believe that urbanisation is one of the main trends in the development of the country. It is better to pull people to the infrastructure than vice versa. This is one of the key points in economic policy,” the speaker said.
Anuar Buranbayev emphasises that the trend of urbanisation in China has created a powerful direction for changing geography, trade and financial flows. Well-developed agriculture is located in those countries where there are strong cities. It is primarily required by the markets.
“We will not be able to live in the village. Is it possible to create global cities in a small country with a population of 18 million? It depends on whether we can continue to compete globally. This is just a challenge. Almaty today is a developed medium-sized metropolis with its own culture and tradition. Astana is another experiment. Perhaps there the nation is becoming a nation. The third model is Shymkent. We hope that all of them will be correct. All three cities will have no competition among themselves. Everyone has a different fate and work in different directions. What defines cities? When it is attractive for investment, talent and innovation. These are three key issues,” said the head of the centre.
Reported by Kapital (Kazakhstan).
