Mega Smart Cities as accelerator for sustainable African futures

Rwanda will in October 2016 host the third Transform Africa Summit that will focus on developing 'smart cities.'  The engine for change in Africa can be expected to be closely linked to the development of megacities in Africa. Within many emerging markets such as South Africa and Nigeria, the leading commercial hub or financial centre accounts for at least one-third or more of national GDP. For example Lagos compared with African national economies would be Africa’s 7th largest economy.

Cities are mankind’s most enduring and stable mode of social organisation, outlasting all empires and states over which they have presided. Today cities have become the world’s dominant demographic and economic clusters and would be central to create better but also sustainable futures. It is not population or territorial size that drives world-city status, but economic influence, political stability, proximity to zones of growth, and attractiveness for foreign capital. In the information age at the advent of the so-called fourth revolution of the information age, provides significant opportunities for development, including by-passing traditional infrastructure requirements. Increasingly in the context of city importance, connectivity matters more than size and traditional infrastructure configurations.

The rise of emerging market megacities as magnets for regional talent and wealth has been the most significant contributor to shifting the world’s focal point of economic activity. African cities are especially well-positioned to leapfrog the development of global ‘smart cities’. The concept of ‘smart cities’ has become synonymous with high-tech urban innovation in developed countries, where technology-based solutions leverage existing infrastructure in innovative ways to solve the daily challenges of city life. 

However, the concept is more than about employing advanced technologies. Smart cities efficiently drive sustainable economic growth, prosperity, competitiveness and a better life for citizens through smart solutions. In practice smart cities refers to activities related to issues such as the boosting of the general connectivity of cities, implementation of  e-government and enhancement of citizen participation though IT systems, and the improvement of the overall urban mobility strategy as well as a smarter public transport system.

The key advantage for technological adoption is that many African cities do not suffer from the crippling costs associated with the maintenance of legacy infrastructure and systems. However, African cities face many developmental challenges need to be overcome. They therefore have the opportunity to start leapfrogging their more developed peers. Some, in fact, have already started leveraging connectivity to transform into smarter cities.

There are far more functional cities in the world today than there are viable states. Indeed in the developing world, cities are often the islands of governance and order in far weaker states where they extract whatever rents they can from the surrounding country while also being indifferent to it. This is how Lagos views Nigeria, Karachi views Pakistan, and Mumbai views India: the less interference from the capital, the better.

Another, longer-term issue that cities will have to grapple with is who will be developing the smart-city solutions for them. In the early stages of the transformation, when deployment of networked infrastructure and establishment of operation centres are the main focus, close partnerships with infrastructure providers can be enough for governments to access the necessary level of services needed. Much development will still need to be undertaken to fully implement smart city solutions. Rapid development related to the Internet of Things as well as Big Data will; however, provide practical solutions to implement smart cities in the medium to longer term.  

Sources

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Iguacu.com, 2016 Smart cities in Africa http://weareiguacu.com/goodnews/africas-smart-cities/ (Accessed 6 May 2016)

Kazeem, Y. 2016. Lagos is Africa’s 7th largest economy and is about to get bigger with its first oil finds. 5 May. http://qz.com/676819/lagos-is-africas-7th-largest-economy-and-is-about-to-get-bigger-with-its-first-oil-finds/ (Accessed 6 May 2016)

Khanna, P. 2016. Megacities, not nations, are the world’s dominant, enduring social structures. Quartz.  http://qz.com/666153/megacities-not-nations-are-the-worlds-most-dominant-enduring-social-structures-adapted-from-connectography (Accessed:  22 April 2016)

Lima, J. 2016, 5 of the biggest Internet of Things smart city projects from around the world. Computer Business Review Online, 3 May. http://www.cbronline.com/news/internet-of-things/smart-technology/5-mega-smart-city-projects-from-around-the-world-4881856 (Accessed:  4 May 2016)

Mwai, C. 2016. Africa: 2016 Transform Africa to Focus On Smart Cities. The New Times. 18 May. http://allafrica.com/stories/201605180014.html (Accessed:  18 May 2016)