Moving to Pretoria

Today we look at moving to Pretoria in South Africa from Belgrade in Serbia. 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 Pretoria people speak 11 official languages including English, Afrikaans, Sesotho, Setswana, Xhosa and Zulu. In Belgrade people speak Serbian.

Pretoria is a city located in the northern part of Gauteng Province, South Africa. It is one of the country's three capital cities, serving as the executive (administrative) and de facto national capital. Belgrade is the capital and largest city of Serbia. As the national administrative (executive) capital of South Africa, Pretoria is the seat of government and houses the headquarters of the main government departments and ministries. As the de facto capital city, it also hosts the foreign embassies and diplomatic missions. The city is a major commercial centre and an important industrial centre. Its main industries are iron and steel works, copper casting, and the manufacture of automobiles, railway carriages and heavy machinery. Belgrade is the central economic hub of Serbia, and the capital of Serbian education and science.

The overall cost of living rank in Pretoria is 145 out of 300 global locations, which equates it with middle cost of living locations.  An expatriate moving from Belgrade to Pretoria will experience a change in cost of living of 4.3%.
In terms of the hardship people are likely to experience, assessed in global terms, Pretoria is ranked as a high degree of hardship location with a hardship index of 30% compared to Belgrade with a hardship index of 40% which is an extreme hardship location.

Source: Cost of Living Pretoria South Africa as at July 2011.