eThekwini Municipality - Durban Scoops 4th Most Livable City Award
2018-03-21
The 20th Mercer’s Quality of Living report released yesterday, 20 March 2018, has once again voted Durban the most liveable City in South Africa.
Mayor Zandile Gumede said this once again shows that we are on the right path, it proves that eThekwini Municipality is growing its economy and meeting the needs of its people, and is fast becoming a world city that all citizens are truly proud of.
“Our Municipality has achieved this accolade for the 4th consecutive year. We are proud to be acknowledged for our service delivery programmes and we strive to continue to make a positive impact in the lives of our residents. The Municipality’s new Radical Economic Transformation Framework aims to further accelerate service delivery, provide economic opportunities to previously disadvantaged citizens and grow the small businesses in our communities†she said.
Durban was placed 89th, six places above Port Louis who placed 83rd and ahead of Cape Town and Johannesburg who ranked 94th and 95th respectively. The survey by Mercer evaluated the cities according to 39 factors across 10 categories, including the political and social environment, the economic environment, public services and transport, housing, education, recreation and the natural environment.
Mercer’s authoritative survey is one of the world’s most comprehensive and is conducted annually to enable multinational companies and other organisations to compensate employees fairly when placing them on international assignments. In addition to valuable data on relative quality of living, Mercer’s surveys provide hardship premium recommendations for more than 450 cities throughout the world; this year’s ranking includes 231 of these cities.
The data was largely analysed between September and November 2017, and it will be updated regularly to account for changing circumstances.
This year, Mercer provides a separate ranking on City Sanitation, which analyses cities’ waste removal and sewage infrastructure, levels of infectious disease, air pollution, water availability and quality - all important aspects of a city’s attractiveness for both talent and businesses.
Mercer’s survey also includes a city infrastructure ranking that assesses each city’s supply of electricity, drinking water, telephone and mail services, and public transportation as well as traffic congestion and the range of international flights available from local airports.
This is great news for the eThekwini Municipality which aims to be Africa’s most liveable and caring city by the year 2030 and at this rate it looks like it might just get there a bit sooner than planned, added Mayor.
ENDS
Issued by the Office of the Mayor, Mthunzi Gumede.