Vancouver (Canada) continues to top the Economist Intelligence Unit's global liveability survey. A score of 98% bodes well for visitors during the Winter Olympics this year. Conversely, as security concerns abound in Sub-Saharan Africa following the Africa Cup of Nations, Football World Cup host Johannesburg (South Africa) comes in joint 92nd place with a score of 69.1%. Nonetheless, this is still the highest score in Sub-Saharan Africa.
Jon Copestake, editor of the report, comments: "Vancouver scores well across all categories in the survey and the forthcoming Winter Games contribute to a strong score in the cultural and sporting events category. Johannesburg has had well-documented crime problems, but performs better in other categories, with the highest overall liveability rating in Sub-Saharan Africa."
Elsewhere, European and North American cities continue to dominate the top tier of the ranking, alongside cities in Australia and New Zealand. Other regions fair less well, especially Sub-Saharan Africa, with security concerns under renewed scrutiny following attacks on the Togo national football team in the 2010 Africa Cup of Nations in Angola. The ongoing social and economic crisis in Zimbabwe ensures that Harare is still the worst of the 140 cities surveyed.
The Economist Intelligence Unit's liveability survey assesses living conditions in 140 cities around the world. A rating of relative comfort for 30 indicators is assigned across five broad categories: stability; Healthcare; culture and environment; education; and infrastructure. The survey gives an overall rating of 0-100, where 1 is intolerable and 100 is ideal.
A tale of two cities
Vancouver (Canada) still sits atop the global ranking, with the city offering an excellent infrastructure and low crime levels ahead of playing host to the 2010 Winter Olympic Games. Despite controversy surrounding the growing number of homeless people in Vancouver, particularly proposals to force people into shelters during the Olympics, general liveability levels are high. Visitors will benefit from good transport links and broad cultural and recreational availability, notably the Olympics themselves although, as with any large event in any large city, there is still some prevalence of petty crime.
Johannesburg (South Africa), host to the world's other major sporting event this year, fares less well. Security concerns over the 2010 Football World Cup abound and this is reflected in the city's position of joint 92nd in the ranking with a score of 69.1%, almost 30 percentage points lower than that achieved by Vancouver. Security is the main concern in South Africa, owing to a well-documented struggle with violent crime rates. However, Johannesburg does enjoy strong availability of cultural and recreational activities, ensuring that visitors to this year's Football World Cup will have plenty to do in addition to watching the tournament. South African cities also achieve the highest liveability scores in a region plagued by instability and problems with health and infrastructure.
Looking ahead
Ironically, Johannesburg shares its joint 92nd position with two of the major cities of the next host of the Football World Cup, Brazil, which will stage the contest in 2014. Both Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo have the same overall liveability score as Johannesburg, although both benefit from slightly higher levels of stability, with lower scores in other categories resulting in parity (note that Rio de Janeiro will also host the 2016 Summer Olympic Games). Awarding high-level sporting events to developing cities provides an opportunity for investment in infrastructure needed to raise levels of liveability in these locations and also to prompt investment in countries more generally.
Turning to other upcoming sporting events, the Rugby World Cup in 2011 will be held in New Zealand, where liveability scores are at the top of the scale. Auckland, host to the Rugby World Cup final, is the tenth most liveable of the 140 locations surveyed and achieves a score of only 2.3 percentage points lower than top-rated Vancouver. Conversely, in the same year, the Cricket World Cup will take place in locations at the other end of the ranking amid security concerns following the 2009 attack on the Sri Lankan national cricket team in Pakistan. Although the 2009 attack led to Pakistan's exclusion as a host nation, other hosts such as Sri Lanka and Bangladesh are home to locations in the bottom ten of the league table, and worst category of liveability (Colombo is 132nd and Dhaka is 138th, with liveability scores of just 47.3% and 38.7% respectively). Locations in India, the third host nation, fare a little better, with Mumbai (117th) and New Delhi (113th) scoring 56.5% and 58.6% respectively.
In Western Europe, London, host to the 2012 Olympic Games, sits in 54th position with a liveability score of 88.4%. This is almost 10 percentage points below Vancouver's score, but London remains in the very top tier of the liveability ranking. Although concerns have been raised about the city's ability to meet the infrastructural demands of the Olympics, stability, particularly following terrorism attacks in July 2007, is the poorest-performing liveability category. Also in 2012, Warsaw and Ukraine are set to co-host the European Football Championship. Warsaw scores relatively well in areas important to visitors to the event, with stability, infrastructure, and culture and the environment all scoring 80% or more. Ukraine lies 91st in the ranking and only marginally outscores Johannesburg, Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo with a rating of 69.2%.
About the Liveability survey
The concept of liveability is simple: it assesses which locations around the world provide the best or the worst living conditions. Assessing liveability has a broad range of uses, from benchmarking perceptions of development levels to assigning a hardship allowance as part of expatriate relocation packages. The Economist Intelligence Unit's liveability rating, part of the Worldwide Cost of Living Survey, quantifies the challenges that might be presented to an individual's lifestyle in 140 cities worldwide. Each city is assigned a score for over 30 qualitative and quantitative factors across five broad categories:
* Stability
* Healthcare
* Culture and environment
* Education
* Infrastructure
Each factor in each city is rated as acceptable, tolerable, uncomfortable, undesirable or intolerable. For qualitative indicators, a rating is awarded based on the judgment of in–house analysts and in–city contributors. For quantitative indicators, a rating is calculated based on the relative performance of a number of external data points. The categories are compiled and weighted to provide an overall rating of 1–100, where 1 is considered intolerable and 100 is considered ideal. The report considers that any city with a rating of 80 or more will have few, if any, challenges to living standards. Liveability scores can be scaled as follows:
The suggested liveability scale
Rating Description
80–100 There are few, if any, challenges to living standards
70–80 Day–to–day living is fine, in general, but some aspects of life may entail problems
60–70 Negative factors have an impact on day-to-day living
50–60 Liveability is substantially constrained
50 or less Most aspects of living are severely restricted
Top 10 cities
Rank Country City Rating
1 Canada Vancouver 98.0
2 Austria Vienna 97.9
3 Australia Melbourne 97.5
4 Canada Toronto 97.2
5 Canada Calgary 96.6
6 Finland Helsinki 96.2
7 Australia Sydney 96.1
8= Australia Perth 95.9
8= Australia Adelaide 95.9
10 New Zealand Auckland 95.7
Bottom 10 cities
Rank Country City Rating
130= Senegal Dakar a 48.3
132 Sri Lanka Colombo 47.3
133 Nepal Kathmandu 47.1
134 Cameroon Douala 43.3
135 Pakistan Karachi 40.9
136 Nigeria Lagos 39.0
137 PNG Port Moresby 38.9
138= Algeria Algiers 38.7
138= Bangladesh Dhaka 38.7
140 Zimbabwe Harare 37.5
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