You should spend about 20 minutes on this task.

The bar chart below gives information about the percentage of the population living in urban areas in the world and in different continents.

Summarise the information by selecting and reporting the main features, and make comparisons where relevant.

Write at least 150 words.

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Model Answer

The bar chart illustrates the proportion of urban residents in six different areas of the world in 1950, 2007 as well as projections to 2050.

It can be seen that the proportion of the world’s population living cities will have increased between 1950 and 2030. However, the change is more pronounced in regions than others.

For example, rapid urbanisation is expected in Africa and Asia, whose urban population is estimated to rise from just around 15% in 1950 to over 60% in 2050. The proportion of city dwellers in Ocenia, on the other hand, only saw a modest rise from 62% in 1930 to 71% in 2007, and is estimated to be just around 76% in 2050.

In Latin America and the Caribbean, only 42% of people were living in cities in 1970, a little less that the figure for Europe,which is at 51%. By 2007, however, the the latter had been surpassed by the former by around 4%, and this trend is expected to continue to 2050. Finally, North America is consistently the most urbanized region in the world from 1950 (64%) to 2050 (90%).