By Andrei Skvarsky.
Online real estate dealer Lamudi says that, unlike their overpopulated counterparts in the industrialised world, megacities in emerging market countries are still on the rise and offer a gamut of opportunities for investment and other business activities.
Riyadh is one such city. As Saudi Arabia diversifies its economy to reduce its dependence on oil and gas, Riyadh-based banks and financial markets are stepping up their role in creating investment opportunities, the Berlin-heaquartered dot-com company, which does business in more than 30 emerging and frontier market countries, argued in a statement.
Riyadh is 14th on the March 2015 Global Financial Centres Index of commercial think tank Z/Yen, the London-based firm’s latest ranking of 82 principal financial centres. The Saudi capital was 21st on the September 2014 GFCI, which listed 83 cities.
Riyadh is also the main financial centre in the Middle East, according to the 2015 GFCI, having overtaken Dubai and Abu Dhabi, which were above it on the 2014 list.
“Ambitious development projects in the city are expected to boost the local economy, offering local and international financial institutions, bodies and banks a home in Saudi,” Lamudi said in its statement.
Other metropolises mentioned by Lamudi are Lagos, Africa’s second fastest-growing city, Colombo, which is “undergoing a dramatic transformation”, Jakarta and Manila, which Lamudi described as hubs of high-tech innovation and development, Karachi and Mexico City.
Emerging market megacities are places with “young and growing populations, coupled with economic growth – including strong GDP projections”, the statement said.
The statement quoted Lamudi co-founder and managing director Paul Philipp Hermann as saying: “Investors are recognising a change in megacities in the emerging markets. Businesses are benefiting from a number of reforms over the past five years, with an increasing number attracted to the abundance of opportunities in these rapidly growing cities… Economic activity within developing countries is only expected to progress in coming years, as government reforms support financial, educational and technological development.”
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