Population rise adds to Egypt’s woes

The number of people in Greater Cairo is expected to grow by half a million this year, hurting the economy’s recovery

CAIRO // The population of Greater Cairo is set to rise by 500,000 this year, more than any other city in the world.

That will add to the pressure on the country’s economy, which is struggling to recover from six years of political turmoil.

Greater Cairo – a metropolitan area including the cities of Cairo, Giza and Qalyubia – is home to 22.8 million people, and it will gain another half a million in 2017, said a Euromonitor report released last week. That represents a quarter of Egypt’s population of 92 million.

The national natural population growth of 2.4 per cent per year is double the average of other developing countries, said Mohamed Abdelgalil, adviser to the central agency for public mobilisation and statistics.

Poverty in southern Egypt pushes many families to have several children in the hope that they can become sources of income. Those children eventually migrate to larger cities for job opportunities scarce in their hometowns.

“In rural areas, and in the south in particular, poor families have many children because they see these children as a safety net,” said Maysa Shawky, head of the national population council. “Also, many of them have daughters until they have sons. They want to produce breadwinners. Instead of hiring a worker, they could have their children help them.” Ms Shawky said awareness campaigns at universities and schools had started as part of a national population strategy.

Internal migration is one of the main causes of overpopulation in Cairo.

Egypt lists 351 slums as unsafe, most of them in the sprawling capital where the poorest have built ramshackle homes that lack basic amenities such as sewerage services and water supply. About 850,000 people were believed to live in such dangerous slums.

“For the average citizen to not be affected by increases in the prices of goods and services, the economic expansion rate must be double the natural population growth rate,” said Mr Abdelgalil.

Egypt’s economic growth was 4.3 per cent between 2015 and last year – not enough to achieve that. The IMF expects GDP growth to be about 4 per cent this year.

A new administrative capital, announced in March 2015, is intended partly to reduce the crowding in Cairo. About 45 kilometres to the east, it will be home to government ministries, housing and an airport.

People would start moving to the new city, which has yet to be named, next year, said Khaled Abbas, assistant to the housing minister for technical affairs.

Work on about 18,000 residential units is nearing completion and they will be put up for sale next month.

Egypt’s population growth rate of 2.4 per cent a year is double the average of other developing countries