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Jo’burg takes the prize: world’s cheapest city
In its latest global cities cost of living survey for 2002, Mercer Human Resource Consulting found that Johannesburg outranked 143 other cities as the world’s cheapest city.
Using New York as the base city scoring 100 points, Hong Kong scored 124.2, making it the world’s most expensive city. By contrast Johannesburg is three-and-a-half times cheaper with an index score of 34.4 points.
Results show that the gap between the world’s most and least expensive cities is narrowing. In the last year alone, the difference has reduced by nearly 15%.
The survey found that Harare in Zimbabwe has leaped ahead of other cities to become the continent’s most expensive city. It has moved up from position 130 to 26. The main reason cited was the high rate of inflation due to the current political and economical situation. Furthermore, the current fixed exchange rate (an article in The Star today claimed that instead of the pegged rate of Z$55 = US$1, the black market is fetching around Z$800 for a US$) was clearly leading to price increases.
The survey said that despite the rand’s fall over the last year, (around 40% late last year, although it’s recovered half those losses this year) inflation has generally been kept in check Africa’s most expensive cities are:
1. Harare, Zimbabwe index 2002: 81.3 index 2001: 50.8
2. Cairo, Egypt index 2002: 72.9 index 2001: 77.3
3. Algiers, Algeria index 2002: 70.1 index 2001: 67.2
4. Lagos, Nigeria index 2002: 69.5 index 2001: 58.4
5. Abidjan, Ivory Coast index 2002: 67.6 index 2001: 66.4
6. Accra, Ghana index 2002: 64.7 index 2001: 56.4
7. Casablanca, Morocco index 2002: 63.7 index 2001: 63.9
8. Dakar, Senegal index 2002: 63.1 index 2001: 61.0
9. Tunis, Tunisia index 2002: 54.9 index 2001: 51.3
10.Lusaka, Zambia index 2002: 54.1 index 2001: 52.8
11. Blantyre, Malawi index 2002: 47.8 index 2001: 29.3
12. Jo’burg, RSA index 2002: 34.4 index 2001: 43.4
(Miguel de Sousa) Information supplied by Travel News Now
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