Urbanization in Africa
[1] It is estimated that in 1900, about 89% of inhabitants lived from the primary occupations of farming, hunting and gathering, cattle nomadism, and fishing (Aase, 2003:1) meaning that 11% or less were urban.
At the start of the independence period in 1957, 14.7% of Africa's inhabitants were urban, in 2000 had it risen to 37.2% and it is expected to rise to 49.3% in 2015, in effect 3.76% to 3.35% per year (UN, 2002).
[5][page needed] This could often times create tension between the ethnic groups and a constant struggle for who has authority over one another.
Arabic scholars like Ibn Khaldun have been a very important source of historical accounts from this area and period.
The growth and strength of the 3 kingdoms of Mali, Ghana, and Songhai can be attributed to their fertile and easily farmable environment.
[4] In the West African forest region, cities developed among the Yoruba, Fulani, Hausa people as well as in the Ashanti Empire and Benin kingdom.
[15] Important cities: The Ethiopian Empire amassed a large number of trade networks and acquired western goods as a result.
[3] Zimbabwe testifies to an urban Shona civilization that left many ruins, even showing evidence for complex agriculture.
The earliest inhabitants of the Angola area are believed to have been Khoisan hunter-gatherers whose remains date back to the Old Stone Age.
In 1914 only Ethiopia and Liberia were left as independent states, the remainder of the continent was under British, French, Portuguese, German, Belgian, Italian or Spanish control.
A good example is Northern Nigeria Protectorate that in 1900 had a budget of £100,000, a military force of 2000 Hausa-soldiers and 120 British Army officers.
The central administration was often placed in harbour town, but there was not developed any network of small and middle-sized cities (Aase, 2003:3).
Examples include Johannesburg and Kimberley in South Africa, Ndola and Kitwe in Zambia and Lubumbashi in DR Congo.
A strong centralised political system was also important in the development of early urban centres for example in the Ndebele Kingdom under Mzilikazi and later on Lobengula Some cities were used and some were ignored.
The commercial politics of raw inputs exporting to finance the colony and develop Africa governed the way what cities that should grow.
One of the colonial governments' response was to separate Europeans, Asians and Africans from each other and establish influx control laws.
The new policies tried to strengthen the authorities' control over land and city growth, and make life easier for the European administration.
World War II caused considerable urbanization and industrialization in the Union of South Africa and led to large numbers of non-whites migrating to cities to seek work in factories.
This trend led to increasing dissent against the white minority's racial segregation policies and housing shortages, with many blacks barred from entering cities because of pass laws living in squatter camps such as Soweto.
B. M. Hertzog and D. F. Malan issued the Sauer Report recommending the opposite solution of intensified segregation.
The HNP won the 1948 South African general election and subsequently implemented these policies as apartheid.
Many parastatal companies are today left as 'white elephants' and demonstrate the great investments that were made in the cities at the beginning of the post-colonial period (Rakodi, 1997).
The new capitals were meant to give the nation a 'fresh start', they were supposed to be the beginning of a new golden future promised by the liberation politicians.
Tema could be said to be a success as it is the most important port today, and together with Accra represent the biggest metropolitan area in Ghana (The World Bank Group, 2001; UN, 2003b; Obeng-Odoom, 2013).
This led to more rural-urban migration in the newly liberated countries (Rakodi, 1997), and a stable decline in urbanization growth from 1950 to 1990 in South Africa.
From figure 1 one can see that after the end of apartheid in 1990, the urbanization rate grow from 2.29% to 3.41%, while it continues to sink in the rest of Africa.
However, even the remnants of these regulations could have an effect on how the cities grew, since they made it difficult to get hold of legally owned land.
The five African countries that in 2001 ranked highest on the United Nations Human Development Index was also some of the most urbanised, see figure 2.
Finally it should be mentioned that war and economic misconduct have led to the dilution of rural resources and periodically very high rural-urban migration.
