Meeting the challenges of China’s growing cities

Within a generation, a billion people will live in China’s cities. The changes wrought by mass migration will be severe. Farmland will be lost to urban development, demand for energy and natural resources will spiral upward, and pressure to provide migrants with basic services such as health care and education will strain city budgets.
Urbanization in China is inevitable, and policy makers must rethink the way they guide these significant changes. A study by the McKinsey Global Institute shows that encouraging more concentrated development, with growth channeled to the largest cities, offers the optimal trade-off between the benefits and potential problems of urbanization.

Exhibit 1: The distribution of China’s urban dwellers among different kinds of cities will determine the shape of the country’s urban future.
Exhibit 2: Migration will be the driving force of future urbanization.
Exhibit 3: China is moving toward an urban population of one billion by 2030.

Zhang Ting Jun
China Construction—Pudong, 2006
Oil on canvas
100 × 150 cm
Courtesy of Art China Contemporary Gallery

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