Moving to Mbabane

Today we look at moving to Mbabane in Swaziland from Honiara in Solomon Islands. We highlight cost of living and other major differences likely to be experienced in our series of short blogs on moving between different international locations.
In Mbabane people speak Swazi and English (both official). In Honiara people speak English (official) and Melanesian dialects.

Mbabane is the capital and largest city of Swaziland. Honiara is the capital of the Solomon Islands. Mbabane, and Swaziland itself, depend on tourism and sugar exports. Honiara industry consists of several beverage factories and a cookie factory. Major exports are timber, coconuts, copra and fish. Honiara International Airport is located about 10 kilometers outside the city.

The overall cost of living rank in Mbabane is 211 out of 300 global locations, which equates it with low cost of living locations.  An expatriate moving from Honiara to Mbabane will experience a change in cost of living of -22%.
In terms of the hardship people are likely to experience, assessed in global terms, Mbabane is ranked as a high degree of hardship location with a hardship index of 30% the same as Honiara.

Source: Cost of living Mbabane Swaziland as at July 2011.