10. 4 10. 1 beijing rio de janerio cairo istanlbul osaka tianjin 11. 7 11. 5 12. 6 11. 5 11. 4 11. 0 10. 3 source : united nations ( 2002 ). figure 1 : growth in urban and rural population in asia over the years source : un, 2002 by 2030, asia alone will have about 2. 7 billion urban people accounting for over 50 per cent of its total population. all the other regions of the world will have a combined urban population of about 2. 3 billion. six of the 10 countries with the largest urban populations are in asia. urbanisation in bangladesh has been among the fastest in the world ( 5. 6 per cent during 1950 - 2000 ). the only african country in the top 10 list, nigeria, has also urbanized very rapidly in the past 5 decades ( world urbanisation prospects, 2001 ). interestingly, by 2010, lagos is projected to become the third largest city in the world. moving to the city level urbanisation trends, the growth of urban agglomerations in developing countries has far exceeded that in developed countries. in 1950, there was only one city with a population of over 10 million people : new york city. in 2000 there were 17 cities with a population above 10 million, 22 cities with population between 5 and 10 million ; 402 with a population of 1 to 5 million ; and 433 in the 0. 5 to 1 million category. an important characteristic of urbanisation in asia has been the emergence of mega - cities – large multi - nuclear urban agglomerations of more than 10 million people. there were no such agglomerations in asia in 1950, two in 1975 and by 2000, 10 of the 17 global megacities were in asia. it is expected that 12 out of the 21 mega cities in the year 2015 will be in asia ( table 4 ). of the 21 cities expected to reach 10 million plus by 2015, 17 of them will be in developing countries. of these 17 cities, 11 of them will be in developing countries in asia and those will be dhaka, mumbai, delhi, jakarta, kolkata, karachi, shanghai, metro manila, beijing, istanbul and tianjin ( table 5 ). table 5 : out of the 10 most populous countries 6 are asian country per cent urban population ( mn ) per cent urban population ( mn ) per cent urban population ( mn ) china 12. 5 35. 8 59. 5 india 17

of banks and companies taking into account the structure, terms and nature of corporate debt. i would like to emphasise that we carry out these transactions in order to prevent situations when excessive exchange rate volatility and its considerable deviation from fundamental levels create financial stability risks and result in higher depreciation and inflation expectations. in particular, now that risks arising from the ruble exchange rate dynamics have aggravated, the bank of russia came up with interventions in the foreign exchange market. of course, we will also consider the impact of operations in the foreign exchange market on the ruble liquidity and ease the negative effect of growing structural deficit on the credit institutions ’ balance sheets. besides, we are especially concerned about the collateral adequacy and will take further measures to decrease pressure on market - traded bonds through providing liquidity against other types of assets. amid the increased volatility of the foreign exchange market, the bank of russia will stick to the conservative approach to the assessment of banking sector demand for liquidity. meanwhile, the volume of ruble liquidity provision will be sufficient for the banking system to function properly and the money market rates to remain within the interest rate corridor bounds. the bank of russia will also continue to permanently monitor the situation in all the segments of the financial market and is ready to take the required measures to ensure its stable functioning. it is crucial for normal functioning of the economy and successful implementation of all macroeconomic policy measures. currently the russian economy faces both external and internal challenges. the uncertainty over further developments is really high and the sensitivity of the economy and especially the financial markets to various developments increases, at some point the reaction can be excessive. in these conditions the bank of russia is ready to be flexible and take unconventional decisions in meeting strategic objectives of ensuring financial and price stability. bis central bankers ’ speeches