The World Health Organization (WHO) ranks cities not by how beautiful or rich they are but strictly by their environmental cleanliness.
African cities might be inferior in infrastructural developments compared to European cities. Still, some of them can stand side by side with the cities in Europe to compete when it comes to cleanliness.
A clean city has neat surroundings, an exciting ecosystem, and well-organized landmarks. Therefore, cleanliness is an excellent source of pride for any country.
Let’s discuss the cleanest cities in Africa that have taken a bold step in neatness and environmental sanitation.
Counting down to the cleanest among all, the cities are:
15. Asmara, Eritrea
Asmara, the capital city of Eritrea, is the 15th cleanest city on the list of cleanest cities in the African continent.
The city is not only a gorgeous, clean, or amiably cool city but also a relaxed and safe city with minor hassles.
Steadily, people praise Asmara for its serene, crime-free atmosphere and, majorly, for being one of the cleanest cities in Africa.
Among the features that put Asmara on the list of the 15 cleanest cities in Africa include environmental friendliness, designated city zoning, and planning.
What makes Asmara a clean city in Africa?
The government of Asmara in Eritrea ensures that the city maintains regular sanitation, wastewater treatment, waste management, pollution control, and related others.
Also, the city has good air quality, good sanitary conditions that operate as it should, excellent waste removal, clean assessable water.
Asmara has no unusual noise disturbing the visitors and residents in the city, less noise hazard, and proper garbage disposal.
14. Abuja, Nigeria
Abuja, Nigeria’s federal capital territory, is ranked as the fourteenth cleanest city in Africa.
The city is one of the build-up areas in Nigeria with the nation’s seat of power and headquarters of government agencies.
Why Abuja is a clean city in Africa
The main reasons Abuja o the list of cleanest cities in Africa are proper drainage control and appropriate street/road cleanliness.
In December 2020, a non-governmental organization (NGO), Clean-Up Nigeria (CUN), ranked Abuja as the cleanest city in the country, considering;
- Waste management service – 30%
- Streets/road cleanliness – 30%
- Vegetation and drain controls – 20%
- Residents’ hygiene and sanitation attitude and practice 10%, summing up to 100%
- Public opinion about the city’s cleanliness – 10%
These five performance indicators and other dirt control measures put Abuja on the list of African cleanest cities, not just in Nigeria.
Features that make Abuja a clean city
Since the primary evidence of a beautiful city is its cleanliness, the features that make Abuja a clean city include;
- Adequate disposal and management of liquid waste.
- House to house collections of solid waste by licensed waste management agencies through the help of a compactor vehicle.
- Compulsory monthly sanitation exercise.
- Eradication of hawkers from the street of Abuja adds to the city’s cleanliness.
- Elimination of illegal dumpsites.
- Other features include the city’s drainage and sewage systems, preventing flooding, and observing other forms of hygiene.
13. Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia’s city capital, is the thirteenth city in Africa with a good cleanliness record.
In recent years, the government of Addis Ababa and its residents have made significant moves into improving the city’s cleanliness by observing “operation clean and green Addis Ababa.”
Factors that contribute to Addis Ababa cleanliness
Keeping the city clean is a significant task, and the underlying factors behind the cleanliness of Addis Ababa are as follows:
- Proper management and collection of solid waste by waste collectors will also help keep the city clean.
- Provision of equipped appliances to the street sweepers or cleaners.
- Adopting an extra care plan that involves picking trash thrown out by careless drivers contributes to cleanliness.
- Provision for wastebaskets around the city.
- Disinfecting of school and also drainage cleaning.
- Responsible waste disposal by citizens.
12. Libreville, Gabon
Libreville is another cleanest city in Africa on the list, ranked as number 12 among others.
Libreville, being the capital of Gabon, is a clean city with excellent paved and tarred roads.
How does Libreville maintain cleanliness?
- The distribution of waste bins to households will assist in reducing waste litters.
- Collection of waste from residents by the Gabonese company at least once a week helps keep the city clean.
- Provision of road sweepers that clean the roads and streets of Gabon.
- Provision of numerous waste collection vehicles.
- And finally, the establishment of fines for defaulters to curb environmental littering.
11. Accra Ghana
Accra is a relatively clean city and capital of Ghana, which sits pretty on the eleventh position in terms of city cleanliness in Africa.
Ghana ensures adequate routine sanitation, infrastructural development, and a good attitude of residents in using waste management containers along streets and roads.
Hence, the government ensures to punishment culprits who default the city cleanliness rules.
Methods Accra in Ghana uses in keeping the city clean
- Disbursement of waste collection trucks has helped boost the city’s cleanliness.
- Launching of an initiative known as “clean your frontage” helped ensure that households clean their frontage.
- Creation of refuse collection points.
- Enforcement of bye-laws.
10. Alexandria, Egypt
Being the tenth clean city in Africa, Alexandria, Egypt, keeps the streets clean and eradicates environmental damage regularly.
For decades now, the city has made a significant step to improving its surroundings for Egypt’s absolute cleanliness.
How Alexandria in Egypt maintains cleanliness
The attributable characteristics that contribute to the cleanliness of Alexandria in Egypt are as follows:
- An increased piped water supply to the people.
- Elimination of open defecation.
- Proper attention to waste management and recycling operations assists in keeping the city clean.
- Optimum pollution control across the city and wastewater management solutions.
9. Tunis, Tunisia
Tunis, the capital and largest city in Tunisia, is the ninth cleanest city in Africa.
In Tunis, the city’s body in charge and responsible for maintaining cleanliness is the City Council.
What does Tunis do to keep the city clean?
Tunis has put so many things in check to maintain absolute cleanliness, and it consists of the following;
- Commissioning waster management teams are responsible for waste pick up.
- Provision of GPS-equipped waste pickup trucks for regular waste collection
- Adequate wastewater management and provision of safe and pure drinking water
- Air pollution control for air quality is at a modest rate in Tunis.
- Availability of street sweepers.
8. Nairobi, Kenya
Nairobi in Kenya is also called the “Green City in the Sun,” taking the 8th position on the list of clean cities in Africa.
The clean town is not just the largest among all; instead, it’s also the capital city of Kenya that ensures a clean and healthy environment.
Aspects that made Nairobi a clean city
As the population of Nairobi is increasing, the solid waste in Nairobi is remarkably growing; therefore, the city needs the best possible power to maintain its cleanliness.
Some of the things that helps the city maintain its cleanliness for long includes:
- The creation of a cleanliness policy has improved the city’s disposable systems.
- Monthly clean-up takes place every last Saturday of each month.
- Eradication of illegal dumpsites across the city
- Proper management of wastes
- Sensitization on a clean environment in line with healthy living
7. Gaborone, Botswana
Gaborone has its location in the southeast of Botswana, and it’s the 7th city in Africa that is proud of its cleanliness.
The city’s clean water maintained sanitation, and quality air is evidence of its level of cleanliness.
What contributes to Gaborone Cleanliness?
There is ultimate cleanliness and purity in Gaborone; hence, the city’s refuse disposal satisfaction and tidiness of the environment are moderate.
The quality air and zero noise pollution in the city are among the reasons why Gaborone is neat because a littered environment can’t produce good quality air.
6. Algiers, Algeria
Algiers is the most populous city of Algeria with improved sanitation and arguably the sixth cleanest city in Africa.
In the quest to keep up with cleanliness, the city has tried various means like Algiers Clean Sweep to ensure the atmosphere is constantly neat.
Why is Algiers always neat and clean?
- The city has modernized its water to be 24 hours water accessibility.
- Access to basic sanitation like sewers, latrines, and septic tanks.
- Provision of handwashing basin situated at a critical spot.
- Modest disposal of garbage.
- Quality air and water.
- Wastewater management and noise pollution control.
5. Dar es Salaam, Tanzania
Dar es Salaam is the fifth African city committed to reducing dirt and pollution in its surroundings.
Life in Dar es Salaam is incredible due to its cleanliness and its friendly atmosphere, which is advantageous to the inhabitants’ health.
Why Dar es Salaam is always neat
- Dar es Salaam practices frequent clean-up campaigns.
- Effective garbage collection.
- Creation of helpful strategy for managing solid wastes
- There is a body in charge of collecting and disposing of all domestically generated liquid and gaseous waste.
- The city practices recycling which, in turn, reduce waste materials.
- Dar es Salaam has a strict littering law upon defaulters without a blink.
- The quality of water and air accessible to inhabitants of the city is reasonable.
4. Tangier, Morocco
Tangier is a city in Africa that is immaculately clean, and this reason has got the city the fourth position in the list of cleanest cities in Africa.
The city is currently undergoing rapid development, thereby increasing the rate of waste.
What makes Tangier a clean city
Some qualities make the Tangier city a clean one, and it includes zero air pollution, accessibility to drinking water, and a neat environment.
The city is clean because its government ensures regular sanitation, air quality, and waste disposal.
3. Windhoek, Namibia
Windhoek is the third city in Africa, classified as the cleanest, and it has several amenities that are of the world’s highest standard.
As a result of the city’s obsession with cleanliness, the government introduced a cleaning campaign named “My Waste, My Responsibility.”
The city has also won an international award for its cleanliness.
Measures Windhoek to keep the city clean
Windhoek in Namibia has taken a big step in ensuring the city is constantly clean, and such measures are:
- Mandating residents to clean their surroundings has gone a long way in keeping the city clean.
- Early education about cleanliness and hygiene has also done more good than harm.
- Making sure that all healthy and hardy residents participate in activities on a national clean-up day adds to the city’s cleanliness.
- House-to-house collection of waste has reduced the rate at which the city gets littered.
- The dumping of the garbage at the allocated dumping sites has also helped to keep Windhoek clean.
- The weekly supply of waste bags has helped a lot to maintain cleanliness in the city.
- Annual campaigns to encourage dwellers to take responsibility for the waste they generate makes the city.
2. Port Louis, Mauritius
Port Louis is the 2nd cleanest city in Africa and the country’s political, cultural, and economic center.
The government persuades every resident of Port Louis, the capital city of Mauritius, to maintain personal hygiene and be mindful of the city’s cleanliness.
Why Port Louis is a clean city
Port Louis is themed one of the cleanest cities in Africa due to the following mode of cleanliness below:
- The proper management of solid waste contributes immensely to keeping the city clean.
- Awareness of the need to be environmentally conscious makes the city clean.
- Monthly sanitation around Port Louis is one of the ways the city is kept clean.
- Movement from house to house dirt collection has also trimmed down the littering rate of the city.
- Street sweepers are another positive factor in keeping the city clean.
At all times, the Public Health Department of Port Louis ensures that the residents maintain cleanliness across the city.
1. Cape Town, South Africa
Cape Town is the number 1 cleanest city in Africa, and it has sophistication like that of an urban area.
Cape Town, the cleanest of all the African cities, has won an award of the Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism Annual Cleanest town in the Metro Category.
Factors contributing to Cape Town cleanliness
- Launching a campaign dubbed “city-wide clean-up” has steadily ensured a clean city.
- Residents’ ownership of the environment has decreased the trashing of bins in open spaces and roads.
- Proper management of solid waste and recruitment of expanded public works program
- Removal of illegal dumping sites in the city has done a lot in maintaining cleanliness in the city.
- An annual campaign termed “KeepItClean” by the Cape Town Central City Improvement District (CCID) added to the city’s cleanliness.
Conclusion
The above-mentioned African cities go the extra mile to ensure the cleanliness of the total environment, from appropriate trash collection regularly to disposal and recycling of waste.
We’ve compiled the list of 15 cleanest cities across the continent, starting from the 15th cleanest to the no.1 cleanest, not by the stunning scenery or adornments but by good hygiene, sanitation, and safe water.
