Lagos, world’s most populous city with 88m people by 2100, says GCI

Lagos, Nigeria’s melting pot for trade and commerce, as well as its financial nerve centre, will become the world’s most populous city at the turn of the century, in 2100, so says Global Cities Institute (GCI) in its latest research on cities of the world just released.

Today, as you read this, Tokyo, the Japanese city, is the world’s most populous with about 38 million people.

But by 2050 that title will belong to the city of Mumbia in India with a predicted population of 42.4 million people while Tokyo is expected to post the seventh highest city population at 32.6 million.

By 2050, the Nigerian city of Lagos, on its way to becoming the most populous at the turn of the century, would have registered on the top 10 list with a rounded up figure of 32.6 million residents, just edging Tokyo as a climber on the top ten most populous cities ranking.

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African cities have never made it to the top of the ranking but before Lagos climbs the rostrum in 2100 the Global Cities Institute projects that Kinshasa, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, will be the most populous city in the world by 2075, before being surpassed by the 88 million future residents of Lagos, Nigeria, 25 years after.

The world is estimated to have nearly 10 billion people by 2050 as human population growth continues at an alarming rate, GCI noted.

Today, none of the 10 most populous cities in the world is in Africa, and only two (Sao Paulo and Mexico City) are in Latin America. Change is predicted in the next three decades, however, and based on population growth models, the GCI based at the University of Toronto in Canada, projects that by 2050, the 10 biggest cities in the world would be the following:

1. Mexico City, Mexico: 24.3m people
2. New York, United States: 24.8m people
3. Karachi, Pakistan: 31.7m people
4. Tokyo, Japan: 32.6m people
5. Lagos, Nigeria: 32.6m people
6. Kolkata, India: 33m people
7. Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo: 35m people
8. Dhaka, Bangladesh: 35.2m people
9. Delhi, India: 36.2m people
10. Mumbai, India: 42.4m people