The Top 10 World's Most Liveable Cities & Least Livable Cities
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| New Zealand’s successful fight against Covid-19 made Auckland the most liveable city of 2021 |
Covid-19 has shaken up the Economist Intelligence Unit's (EIU) annual ranking of most liveable cities, propelling Auckland to first place. Auckland tops annual survey of the world's most liveable cities in 2021 followed by Osaka, Tokyo, Adelaide and Wellington - all of which had a swift response to the Covid pandemic.
The top 10 most livable cities in the world
- Auckland, New Zealand (96.0)
- Osaka, Japan (94.2)
- Adelaide, Australia (94.0)
- Wellington, New Zealand (93.7)
- Tokyo, Japan (93.7)
- Perth, Australia (93.3)
- Zurich, Switzerland (92.8)
- Geneva, Switzerland (92.5)
- Melbourne, Australia (92.5)
- Brisbane, Australia (92.4)
* The scores according to The Global Liveability Index 2021
| The index takes into account more than 30 qualitative and quantitative factors spanning five broad categories: stability (25%), healthcare (20%), culture and environment (25%), education (10%), and infrastructure (20%). According to the report, conditions here have deteriorated even further in the past 12 months, especially when it comes to healthcare, due to Covid-19. While the categories were not amended this year, a number of indicators were taken into account, such as stress on healthcare resources and restrictions on local sporting events, when calculating scores for the healthcare, culture and environment, and education categories. |
The 10 least livable cities in the world
1. Damascus, Syria
2. Lagos, Nigeria
3. Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea
4. Dhaka, Bangladesh
5. Algiers, Algeria
6. Tripoli, Libya
7. Karachi, Pakistan
8. Harare, Zimbabwe
9. Douala, Cameroon
10. Caracas, Venezuela
Why Auckland and Facts about the city
Auckland rose to the top of the ranking owing to its successful approach in containing the Covid-19 pandemic, which allowed its society to remain open and the city to score strongly on a number of metrics including education, culture and environment.
Auckland is not universally liked in New Zealand, even by Aucklanders, so it may come as a surprise to hear that the Queen City has topped a list of the world's most liveable cities.
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New Zealand's most-populous city, home to 1.7 million Kiwis, beat out more obvious choices such as Tokyo and Vienna, the champion of the last poll in 2019.
The handling of the Covid-19 crisis seems to be one of the most important factors that dominated while formulating the Economist Intelligence Unit’s Global Liveability Index of 140 cities around the world.
New Zealand has been significantly praised for its handling of the crisis, so it’s no surprise that one of its cities has been named the world’s most livable city for 2021.
‘Big shake-up’ in rankings in the top 10 most livable cities
While Auckland sits on top of the list, Austria’s Vienna, number one in both 2018 and 2019, has completely dropped out of the top 10 after being heavily affected by Covid, and now ranks 12.
The biggest fall overall among the European cities was the port city of Hamburg in northern Germany, which fell 34 places to 47th.
Despite some social restrictions still being in place in Switzerland, the Central European country has seen two its cities move up, with Zurich and Geneva rising from 11th and 14th to seventh and eighth place.
The most notable rise was recorded by Honolulu, Hawaii, in the United States, which came 14th in the ranking and moved up 46 places because of its containment of the pandemic and fast vaccination programme.
While Damascus sits in last place once again "as the effects of the civil war in Syria continue to take their toll," it's closely followed by Nigeria's Lagos, Papua New Guinea's Port Moresby and Bangladesh's Dhaka, which were all in either similar or identical spots in 2019.
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