World Urbanization Pattern: Level of Urbanization

Urbanization patterns at the country level are much more varied than at the regional level. Furthermore, for most countries, the changes experienced over the second half of the twentieth century were remarkable. Thus, whereas in 1960 only a quarter of the all countries or areas in the world had more than 46 per cent of their population living in urban areas, by 2000 nearly half had 57 per cent or more of their population living in urban areas. If the country-level projections presented in this volume prove approximately correct, by 2030 over three-quarters of all countries or areas will have over half of their population in urban areas.

Figure : World level of urbanization from 1960 to 2010

Data Source:  United Nations- World Urbanization Prospects: The 2011 Revision

Level of urbanization that is the percentage of the total population living in urban areas, as defined by the country is not uniform throughout the world. It varies from countries to countries, region to region as illustrated below in the following Map. Though the variation, the overall scenario of the percentage of urban population is increasing rapidly.

It is seen in the following Map that Asia and Africa have low level of urbanization than those of developed regions. So, urbanization is closely related with development as it started with city centered economy. 

Map : Level of urbanization (world)