A South African's guide to moving to and making it in Malta: People who need people

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Atlasandboots.com did the heavy lifting in ranking 237 nations from least densely populated to most (table below). If you subscribe to Sartre’s dictum that hell is other people, then consider relocating to Antarctica, Greenland, Svalbard or the Falklands, as each of these boast a population density of less than 1 person per km2.

As a benchmark, South Africa sits at position #73 in terms of least densely populated, clocking in at 44.99 persons per km2.

Reading backwards

But when I flipped the list around to read it backwards, i.e. the most crowded places in the world, I found it made for much more interesting reading – and that Malta is one of the top 10 most densely populated countries on the map.

Starting with the least elbow-room, Macau has a staggering population density of 21,346.42 pax per km2. The next three positions went to Monaco (15,322.5), Singapore (8,188.16) and Hong Kong (6,490.53). Apart from not offering much room to swing a cat, these jurisdictions are notable for their high property prices, indicating some sort of demand-supply correlation.

A South African's guide to moving to and making it in Malta: A cottage for sale

Marcus 'The Maltese Falcon' Brewster  21 Sep 2018

From the midway position in the top 10 most densely populated, we are under 5,000 people per km2, with positions #5, #6 and #7 going to surprise candidates Gaza Strip (4,986.62), Gibraltar (4,522.46) and the Holy See/Vatican City (2,272.73).

At position #8, Bahrain is sub-2,000 people with a density of 1,856.5 population per km2.

The next slots are both archipelagos with parity densities: at #9 the Maldives (1,317.82) and at #10 Malta (1,317.53). The island similarities continue with #11 being Bermuda (1,312.3).

Island sandwich

Much as it’s very seductive to picture Malta sandwiched between the Maldives and Bermuda (neither of which I visualise as being particularly crowded), the Maltese situation may be more open to interpretation than these rankings would suggest.

To whit: Malta has something called ODZ (Outside Development Zone) land. Unlike Monaco, which is unrelievedly high-rise apartment blocks, Malta has a lot of undeveloped land, which is mostly zoned for agriculture. Being an island nation, Malta historically had to be as self-sufficient as possible regarding food security, although nowadays we are a net importer.

I raise the issue of zoning because 70% of Malta is ODZ, meaning outside the town and villages, Malta is countryside. If you own a farm, you can’t just decide to build a shopping centre, a townhouse development or a petrol station!

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The reference to petrol stations is not fatuous – there are about a dozen Planning Authority applications for large forecourts on ODZ land, which on paper make no sense to me.

As an example, an ODZ application on the outskirts of our village of Zejtun was refused last month.

Firstly, there are four existing fuel stations within one kilometre, so convenience or filling-a-gap-in-the-market is not a consideration.

Secondly, Malta is part of the EU, which has defined targets for the phasing out of emission producing engines and the adoption of cleaner/greener transport (electric cars, etc).

These would-be forecourt developers must have their eye on another prize altogether because within the next decade we won’t be permitted to drive cars that require filling up with petrol any longer.

Speed of change

In closing, we all know about the inevitability of change. But it’s somewhat sobering to be reminded of its speed.

It was put to me that it took up till 1950 to develop the first 10% of the Maltese islands.

By the year 2000 – within 50 years – Malta had reached 20% development.

The next 10% happened in a third of that time – in only 17 years Malta had achieved its 30% coverage rate.

Avanti!

7 of the 10 happiest countries in the world have fewer than 23 people per km2 | Atlasandboots.com

The least densely populated countries (and dependent territories) based on the number of people per km2, according to atlasandboots.com: