From today to 2050: Projecting urban growth for 11 000 agglomerations

Between 2020 and 2050, Africa’s population will grow by 900 million people. Eighty percent of this demographic growth will happen in urban areas. By offering spatial and demographic projections for the next three decades, the Africa’s Urbanisation Dynamics 2025 (OECD/SWAC et al, 2025) report stresses the urgency of planning for Africa’s urban expansion. It aims to inform Africa’s decision-makers and urban planners, and to encourage them to take on boldly the challenge of planning Africa’s cities and peripheries.

The urban expansion projections to 2050 used in the report are from the Africapolis database (OECD/SWAC). The report provides policy makers with detailed insights into urban population growth and spatial expansion in over 11 000 urban agglomerations in 54 countries. These projections reveal significant regional trends and spatial features that can inform urban planning at the national, metropolitan and agglomeration levels, shaping sustainable and liveable cities. The universal definition of urban agglomerations used by Africapolis offers a unique understanding of the evolution of African urban systems and provides an ideal input for projections. This is because population and urban footprints are measured consistently across countries and years.

Africapolis projections provide a macro-level picture and enable comparisons at the continental and regional levels, which are crucial scales of analysis for decision-makers, citizens, researchers and professionals, especially planners. The granular information provided is a versatile tool to tackle multifaceted challenges and plan at the local level. Data is collected at the lowest level possible, and can thus facilitate and inform local decision-making. 

Africapolis: Defining urban

Visualise urbanisation in Africa

Covering the whole African continent, Africapolis maps over 11 000 urban agglomerations in 54 countries. Urban agglomerations are defined as continuously built-up areas (with gaps of less than 200 metres between individual buildings) with at least 10 000 inhabitants. Africapolis includes historical demographic data from 1950 to 2020 and spatial boundaries for every agglomeration in 2015 and 2020. Projections for both demographics and spatial boundaries are available at 5-years intervals and up to 2050. Africapolis captures the complete urban system in Africa to enable comparative and long-term analyses of urban dynamics. (OECD/SWAC, 2025), www.africapolis.org

Making room for additional 700 million urbanites

The key challenge facing Africa’s urban agglomerations is how to make room for their growing populations. Projected urban growth will pose major challenges for urban planning as it is outpacing the capacity of many central and local governments to provide housing, basic services, public space and infrastructure. At the same time, the need to build large parts of Africa’s future cities also presents an opportunity to plan cities that are better designed for the 21st century and better equipped to deal with major challenges such as climate change, housing and transport. 

Past failures and current thinking in other regions of the world offer lessons that urban planners and governments can learn from. However, there is also a need for African urban planners to develop and experiment with new ideas, and to integrate local realities and contexts into the design of the continent’s urban future.

The need to plan now

As most urban areas will be built in the next few decades, policy makers must stress the relevance, and strengthen the capacity and speed of urban planning. The way cities are built impacts every aspect of urban life, including access to jobs and services, public space, health, social interactions, safety, the cost of living and doing business. 

It shapes the interactions within urban areas and of urban areas with their surrounding ecosystems and hinterlands. 

By planning for urban expansion, agglomerations can avoid costly errors such as lack of green areas and public spaces, energy-intensive built-up forms and transport, and unhealthy housing conditions (GlobalABC/IEA/UNEP, 2020). On average, an African city is adding 7 urbanites per day, every day, until 2050. This results into a need to plan for all sorts of uses, including public spaces. 

As populations grow, land is required for housing, businesses, public services and utilities and transportation (OECD et al., 2025). In this equation, public spaces often struggle to be a priority. This observation is by no means limited to African cities, but a challenge shared by  municipalities across the world. It is crucial to recognise the role of public spaces and to preserve them as cities grow (Anderson, Patiño Quinchía and Prieto-Curiel, 2022). 

Proactive planning, effective governance and innovative financing strategies are essential to ensure that cities can thrive and deliver on their potential to drive inclusive economic development. By acting now, Africa can manage its urban growth in ways that promote sustainability, inclusiveness and resilience.

The increasing pressure on land and public spaces

Rapid urban growth significantly increases the demand for land, especially in large cities where competition for space is intense. Here, the countryside is less accessible, resulting in higher risks of foreclosing easy access to public spaces. In smaller cities, despite the lower land pressure, it will be crucial to also preserve public spaces – a challenging task when considering restricted budgets and competing investment priorities. 

Data on public spaces is scarce, however, evidence available on green areas shows that these are lacking and disappearing as cities expand. An African level analysis of existing green spaces in the continent shows that as built-up environments grow, green spaces disappear (Anderson, Patiño Quinchía and Prieto-Curiel, 2022). 

Public spaces accomplish a wide variety of needs that span beyond the customary intended leisure and play activities, “they serve as extended living rooms, stimulating communal activities and providing people with space to socialise, relax, and transact. Public spaces are also a vital economic asset and major contributor to livelihoods in a context like Africa, where 85 per cent of the population work in the informal economy” (Roji, 2022). It’s essential that new public spaces consider local needs and realities, avoiding a blind enforcement of expensive, stereotypical and inappropriate planning models.

The opportunities of planning ahead

Urban expansion projections can inform the approach municipalities take to identify and preserve public spaces. By forecasting  urban growth, and the number of inhabitants for the thirty years ahead, these projections  can feed into public policies that are oriented towards securing land rights and land use planning, in areas where the pressure on urban land is still relatively low. This allows for the delivery of public spaces that are in line with the variety of local needs, whether those are political, social or economic. 

The analysis provided in the Africa’s Urbanisation Dynamics 2025 report shows, for example, the large potential to secure and plan land at the peripheries of cities, which will be heavily affected by urban expansion. Where cities grow horizontally, and as urban footprints expand, there is a need to plan peri-urban land wisely and make sure that public and green spaces are going to be available. 

Part of these public spaces might be developed on land that is not suitable for other uses, thus preserving its ecological value whilst being of use, as it has been shown in other world regions (Rojas et al, 2022, Chen, 2025).

African cities can innovate and explore new urban planning solutions through new technologies and data. Integrating climate, environmental and energy considerations into urban growth planning could lead to lasting reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, reduced exposure to extreme weather, and more sustainable, resilient cities (Anderson, Patiño Quinchía and Prieto Curiel, 2022). This offers the opportunity to deliver public spaces whilst also preserving vulnerable natural areas.

Urban governance for sustainable and liveable cities

Urban governance has a critical role to play to accompany rapidly growing cities and tackle existing issues that hinder their economic potential. Urban governance refers to the processes, institutions and actors responsible for managing and overseeing the affairs of cities. In this context, a multitude of stakeholders, local governments and agencies, formal and informal entities collectively decide how to plan, finance and manage urban areas. Local governments play a key role in this context as they represent the needs of residents and are often in charge of managing the delivery of public spaces and services.

Delivering public spaces in Africa’s cities

Urban dwellers engage with public spaces for different purposes. Therefore, it is crucial that new public spaces are designed considering local needs and contexts, rather than imposing costly and generic models that may not reflect the realities on the ground. Recognising the variety of uses and adapting existing and new public spaces to ground realities can help obtain a shared support for their delivery. If the value of such spaces is recognised by the resident communities, there is a higher chance that their premises will be respected and protected against squatting or building (Diep et al, 2022). To reach this goal of creating adapted and locally owned public spaces, it is crucial to involve local stakeholders, including community leaders and customary authorities into the planning and governance frameworks. A multi-level governance approach, that considers the knowledge and added value of local leaders and community dynamics, is therefore key.

Data management and ownership by local communities can further help achieve more accurate diagnostics of local needs. Mapping tools, forums and other services can be useful to identify issues and opportunities for urban development that would not be visible otherwise (Kollektiv Orangotango+, 2018). The recent initiative of Public Spaces for Africa (www.africanpublicspaces.org) aims to redefine what ideal public spaces look like for Africa’s cities. Collecting best practices and experiences of cities delivering public spaces can help shape practices and instruments to build on and improve (Roji, 2022). These exercises can contribute to developing clear visions for public spaces and eventually inform their governance.

The role of land governance

As mentioned above, securing land rights and land use planning are essential tools to plan for urban expansion, including public spaces, and key functions of land governance. In many African countries, the formal land governance system is unable to identify, consolidate, plan, service and deliver land for public, residential and commercial use at the scale required to manage urban growth effectively. This has profound implications for the ability of local governments to meet their land-use planning objectives. Approaches to urban planning and land management should prioritise stakeholder participation and local capacity to manage growth efficiently and inclusively. All this points to the urgent need to reinforce planning capacities at local and regional levels.

Financing public spaces

Rapid urban growth generates strong demand for investment in infrastructure and public services in cities. Current levels of spending do not meet the requirements, leaving large gaps in infrastructure provision and coverage of services. Africa’s cities need more funds for urban development. 

The availability of more funds alone, however, won’t solve the financing challenge. African cities need to better align investment spending with the needs and realities of their residents and businesses. Investments need to cover both formal and informal areas. Local governments, communities and economic sectors should be at the centre of investment planning (OECD et al., 2025).  When considering the delivery of public spaces, it is essential to measure and understand the potential of government land.

Public space delivery might be possible if the information on municipal ownership and vacancies is more readily available, and if communities are ready to step in to pressure for their delivery. Examples from other world regions show that when vacant public land is not made accessible, community action through mapping and lobbying can increase the availability of public spaces (Segal and Kravitz, 2019).

Another crucial element for financing public spaces will be to consider incremental delivery. The wish to replicate stereotyped visions of public spaces, with lush green parks and fully equipped playgrounds, whilst desirable, might not be in line with available budgets, and might delay the delivery of more practical and still appealing public spaces. Gradual upgrades and implementation can represent a more sustainable solution for communities in search for accessible public spaces.

Do you want to learn more about how Africapolis informs city planning in Africa? 

Africapolis is a unique database and data visualisation tool that measures and projects urbanisation trends in Africa from 1950 to 2050. It provides a detailed picture of Africa’s urban agglomerations at local, national, regional and continental levels, helping users to explore the size, location, and projected growth of cities. The platform offers indicators to compare urban population, levels of urbanisation, and the number of agglomerations across different geographies. Thanks to its cross-country comparability and comprehensive continental scope, Africapolis can inform decision- and policy-making across various sectors. It equips policymakers, researchers, and practitioners to better understand and address the challenges of urban and peri-urban development in Africa. It further provides useful insights for experts across sectors, with applications including urban planning, health, education, fiscal policy, environment, and gender equality. Source: (OECD/SWAC, 2025), www.africapolis.org

Building liveable African cities demands action now

Rapid urban growth incrases the pressure on land, intensifying tensions around the use of public spaces. Anticipating and planning for this growth is essential to secure well-located land for public use. Once cities are built, acquiring land for public spaces becomes complex and costly. Taking action today can help to avoid substantial retrofitting expenses and the loss of long-term benefits for urban residents. 

To ensure that public spaces effectively serve urban residents, their planning must be driven by local realities and needs rather than replicating imported models that may not align with community priorities or available financing. 

An incremental financing approach that allocates more resources after essential infrastructure is in place can support this process sustainably. Effective local governance will be crucial to design a clear vision of how public spaces should look like as cities expand. To deliver accessible and sustainable public spaces, it will be crucial to involve all stakeholders, especially resident communities. 

Decision-makers and communities can rely on the newly available Africapolis projection data on urban growth and emerging evidence on the accessibility of green areas within Africa’s cities to accompany policies and identify appropriate locations and types of public spaces (Anderson, Patiño Quinchía and Prieto-Curiel, 2022).

Download the full article here