By Khalifa Hemed
Published March 29, 2018
A global survey has unveiled the world’s best cities for expatriate workers based on quality of living.
The 2018 Quality of Living Survey by a consulting firm called Mercer, names Vienna (Austria), Zurich (Switzerland), Auckland (Australia), Munich (Germany), and Vancouver (Canada) as the the top five best cities for expats.
The Mauritian city, Port Louis, that is ranked at position 83 worldwide in Mercer’s 20th Quality of Living Survey, is the best city in Africa for expats to work and live in. Together with South Africa’s Durban (89), Cape Town (94) and Johannesburg (95) and Seychelles’ Victoria (98),these are Africa’s top five cities in the overall Quality of Living.
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Other African cities ranked by Mercer include Morocco’s Casablanca (124), Namibia’s Windhoek (130), Botswana’s Gaborone (141), Zambia’s Lusaka (150), Senegal’s Dakar (163), Gabon’s Libreville (164) and Ghana’s Accra (165).
Also listed are Uganda’s Kampala (172), Egypt’s Cairo (178), Malawi’s Blantyre (180), Benin’s Cotonou (182), Mozambique’s Maputo (182), Algeria’s Algiers (184), and The Gambia’s Banjul (185).
Kenya’s Nairobi (186), Djibouti’s Djibouti (190), Rwanda’s Kigali (190), Cameroon’s Douala (198), Tanzania’s Dar es Salaam (199), Angola’s Luanda (201), Togo’s Lome (206), Ivory Coast’s Abidjan (208), Ethiopia’s Addis Ababa (208), Zimbabwe’s Harare (210), Nigeria’s Lagos (212) and Abuja (213), Burkina Faso’s Ouagadougou (214), Madagascar’s Antananarivo (217), Libya’s Tripoli (218), Niger’s Niamey 217, Mali’s Bamako (220), Mauritania’s Nouakchott (221), Guinea’s Conakry (222), Congo-Kinshasa’s Kinshasa (223), Congo-Brazzaville’s Brazzaville (224), Chad’s N’Djamena (226), Sudan’s Khartoum (227), Central African Republic’s Bangui (230) also appear on the list that ranks 231 cities.
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Carl Van Heerden, Principal at Mercer and Global Mobility Leader for Africa, says quality of living is one of the important factors that companies weigh when they prepare a long-term strategy around where they should expand and locate global staff.
“A city’s place in the rankings is dependent on local living conditions, which are analysed according to a wide variety of factors which reflect their importance to expatriates,” Van Heerden says. “Appropriate infrastructure, health facilities, safety and security are some of the important aspects that make a city attractive to both talent and businesses.”
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The Mercer Quality of Living survey, which was first published in 1994, is conducted annually to enable multinational companies and other organisations to compensate employees fairly when placing them on international assignments.
Van Heerden says the annual Mercer Quality of Living survey which was first published in 1994, “has become a critical point of reference for multinational companies, which need a full view of the conditions on the ground when considering assigning mobile employees. Our methodology allows multinational employers to provide their expatriates with fair and consistent expatriate compensation packages, when looking to expand into other markets.”
