HYDERABAD: Hyderabad is among the top-10 fastest growing cities in the world, according to the World Economic Forum (WEF). Interestingly, all 10 of the fastest-growing cities in the world are in India. And, going by Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth, this is likely to be the case till 2035, says research institute Oxford Economics.
Hyderabad, with an 8.47% GDP growth, holds the second place among metropolitan cities in India. “Hyderabad will be the second-fastest growing city in the world. It is just marginally behind Bengaluru, and should become number one (in India), since the projections are on a time-series trajectory, and Hyderabad’s actual growth has been geometrically exponential,” said principal secretary, Municipal Administration and Urban Development, Arvind Kumar.
In a few years, Hyderabad’s GDP will cross that of other cities as the state government has big plans to boost infrastructure between the Outer Ring Road and the proposed Regional Ring Road, where major companies from Bengaluru are expected to shift, he added.
Gujarat’s Surat, a diamond processing and trading centre which also has a strong IT sector, will have the fastest economic growth in the world, says the WEF, which predicts that the city will see an annual GDP growth rate of 9.2% from 2019 to 2035. Bengaluru, known as India’s Silicon Valley, will grow at 8.50% year-on-year by 2035, putting it in the third place, after Agra. Vijayawada, which holds the tenth position, will see a growth of 8.16%.
Hyderabad has already overtaken Bengaluru in terms of real estate growth in the first quarter of 2019, Kumar said. The city created commercial space of 3.50 mn sq ft, as against 2.50 mn sq ft in Bengaluru. This means Hyderabad could be the world’s fastest-growing city.