Dhaka: Paying high to live in an unliveable city

In terms of cost of living, Dhaka is ranked close to cities like Toronto, Calgary, Montreal and Lisbon. It is indeed one of the priciest city in South Asia.

Last November, the Intelligence Unit of the British magazine The Economist published its latest survey on the global cost of living. For this survey, the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) compared more than 400 individual prices across more than 200 products and services in 173 cities. 

While Singapore is the priciest city with an index value of 104, Damascus of Syria is the least expensive with an index value of 13. In the survey, Dhaka is shown with a value of 56. 

Meanwhile, Dhaka, the capital city of Bangladesh, holds the 166th position jointly with Harare, Zimbabwe, out of 173 countries on the Global Liveability Index 2023, also by EIU. It stands as the seventh least liveable city on the index.

It is interesting to note something about Damascus and Dhaka. While Damascus sits at the bottom of the global liveability ranking (ranked 173), it is also the least expensive city. But Dhaka, while very expensive, is not quite liveable.

In the previous year's index, Dhaka occupied the same seventh spot at the bottom.

Liveable cities are measured by considering five aspects: sustainability, health care, culture and environment, education and infrastructure.

Of course, there are other cities that are very costly but are ranked low in the liveability index. For example, Hong Kong is the fifth most costly city among the cities in the world, while in the liveability index, it stands at the 92nd position. On the other hand, Calgary in Canada is the 145th most costly city, but it is the 7th most liveable city in the world. 

Why does that happen? 

"High cost of living doesn't ensure better liveability. Whether a city will be liveable or not depends on many things, one would be investing in city planning,"  said Professor Adil Mohammed Khan, a faculty at the Urban and Regional Planning Department of Jahangirnagar University. 

According to Professor Adil, liveability has some indicators – better transport mobility, affordable transport, traffic density as well as affordability of housing, food, education and health. 

"When we say that a city has a high cost of living, it means the city has become highly unaffordable for 40-50% of its population, and the quality of life will become challenging for this group. Be it Dhaka or Hong Kong," he said. 

"If you visit Hong Kong you will see that lower-income people live in cage housing because they cannot afford standard housing. A city can be made liveable with less investment. If there are open spaces and parks, it will ensure better recreation and health. It is not about investing a lot of money, it depends on the city's planning," Professor Adil added. 

Dhaka has a high cost but the city is poorly planned and secures a low spot in the liveability index. That is because our planning and governing body is weak. The city is getting costlier with time, and with more and more people coming to the city, it is getting even more unliveable.

If there is too much investment in a city, that means you are spending a lot of money to get returns, and the city is actually becoming more costly with that. Megacities have large populations, creating a high demand for everything.

With ideal planning, a city can have accessible infrastructure, accessible housing and accessible economic facilities, the professor said. 

The cities in Switzerland, Germany, Canada and other European countries are placed at higher spots in both the indexes- the cost of living is high and they are also highly liveable. 

"It is because developed countries maintain an average standard of liveability. And it is not for just one or two cities, every city of these nations is more or less similarly maintained and planned," Adil said.

"Some cities are mentioned as costly because those cities probably have more white-collar jobs and hence have more demand for housing. It doesn't mean other cities of these countries are not liveable. They have a proper taxation system that is maintained nationwide. So although it might seem that the cost of living should affect the liveability of a city, it does not apply to many of these countries," he added.

The expert pointed out that the quality of housing in Dhaka is poor. The lower-income people live in slums and the housing of the lower middle class is not of good quality. Our transport system neither has affordability nor quality. 

He also said that the amount of open and green spaces and parks is the lowest - one of the worst in the world. We have a huge gap in the primary education and healthcare systems. The disparity here among the income groups is one of the worst in the world.   

We talked to Dr Selim Raihan, the executive director of the South Asian Network on Economic Modelling (Sanem) for an economist's view. 

Bangladesh is a country that has a low per capita GDP, so the liveability of this country is supposed to be low, he said. For example, Canada's GDP per capita for 2022 was $54,966, while the per capita GDP in Bangladesh is $2,528. 

New Delhi has good infrastructure. It is the 25th most costly city in the world, while 141st in the liveability index in 2023, because of its pollution. 

"Our cities, for example, Dhaka, have seen an unplanned development. It is really tough to introduce a new idea or plan here. You will find better performance in the cities that have better planning," Selim Raihan added. 

He mentioned the fact that Bangladesh could not manage inflation. And in this economic situation, the cost of living is very high even for a poor country like Bangladesh. "If you want to enjoy urban facilities, you must pay various formal and informal payments. Everything gets expensive as a result. If you want to ensure citizen facilities in an unplanned city, you will have to bear additional costs," the economist concluded.