Smithsonian Magazine · People & society

UN Endorses Maps That Better Represent Africa's Size

The UN General Assembly voted to endorse global charts that more accurately depict landmass sizes, urging institutions to adopt alternatives to the Mercator projection. This aims to provide a fairer view of global patterns.

The Mercator projection distorts landmass sizes, making polar regions appear larger. Africa is about 14 times larger than Greenland, but they look similar on Mercator maps. The #CorrectTheMap campaign argues this diminishes Africa's significance.

The UN recommends "equal area" maps like the Equal Earth projection (2018), which more accurately portrays landmass sizes, offering a fairer perspective on global patterns.

While Mercator is useful for navigation, it's not ideal for showing landmass sizes. Its use in education and media outside navigation is a concern.

The UN resolution urges adoption where relative landmass sizes are important, emphasizing 2D map limitations. It passed 164-1, with the US voting against.

The US criticized the resolution as a distraction. Ukraine supported accurate African size depiction but had concerns about how some maps show its occupied territory.

Togo plans to update its geography books to reflect more accurate map projections before year-end.

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