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African cities 'expensive for expats'

30 June 2010 Breaking News

Cities in Africa are becoming increasingly expensive for expatriates to live in, according to a major piece of research published this week.

Luanda in Angola is now the world's most expensive city for expatriates, while Ndjamena in Chad is the third most costly. While Tokyo in Japan is the second most expensive, the latest Cost of Living Survey from human resources consulting firm Mercer shows the growing importance of Africa as an economic region to global companies. For the first time, the ranking of the world's top 10 most expensive cities includes three African urban centres; in addition to Luanda and Ndjamena, Libreville in Gabon also features, in seventh place.

Nathalie Constantin-Métral, a senior researcher at Mercer with responsibility for compiling the ranking each year, said that while many people assume that cities in the developing world are cheap, this "isn't necessarily true for expatriates working there".

"To entice talented staff to these cities, multinationals need to provide the same standard of living and benefits that these employees and their families would experience at home," she said. "In some African cities, the cost of this can be extraordinarily high - particularly the cost of good, secure accommodation."

The survey also reveals that Moscow is the fourth most expensvive city followed by Geneva in fifth. London is joint 17^th most expensive, while Karachi is ranked as the world's least expensive city.

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