New Standardized Degree of Urbanisation Variable

Until recently, little has been known about the distribution and degree of urbanicity of the world's urban populations. This is largely because of the fragmented way that countries have historically determined what urban means.

A coalition of international organizations (the EU, FAO, ILO, OECD, UN-Habitat and the World Bank) developed a single global definition called the Degree of Urbanisation that can be applied to any geographic area.

In 2018, Gallup partnered with the European Commission to review more than 170,000 face-to-face geotagged interviews collected through the Gallup World Poll in more than 109 countries in 2017 and 65 countries in 2016. By overlaying the interview geotags against this geospatial layer, we were able to create new globally consistent, harmonized Degree of Urbanisation variable.

This variable provides Gallup data subscribers with an unprecedented opportunity to explore the effect that urbanicity has on several of Gallup's core World Poll variables including: happiness, access to good jobs, and people's desire to migrate.

Important Note: You must be a Gallup data subscriber to use this new variable.