UN Endorses Equal Earth Map, Giving Africa Its Proper Scale

The United Nations rolled out a new resolution on September 5, 2026, urging member states to favour the Equal Earth projection over the centuries‑old Mercator map. 164 countries – India among them – voted in favour; the United States was the lone dissenting voice, while six nations abstained.

Why does this matter? The Mercator projection, first sketched by Gerardus Mercator in 1569, was built for sailors. It keeps compass bearings straight, but in doing so it blows up landmasses near the poles and shrinks those straddling the equator. The result? Canada, Russia and Europe look gigantic, while Africa, a continent roughly fourteen times larger than Greenland, appears oddly modest.

The Equal Earth design, released in 2018 by a global team of cartographers, flips that script. It is an equal‑area projection, meaning the surface of each continent is shown in roughly the right proportion. On an Equal Earth map Africa finally dominates the visual field, sitting comfortably larger than Europe or North America – a stark contrast to its Mercator cousin.

That said, no flat map can be perfect. To preserve area, the Equal Earth projection sacrifices shape and distance, especially toward the poles. Still, many see the trade‑off as worthwhile, because the visual bias of the Mercator has been called “cartographic colonialism” – a subtle, yet powerful, reinforcement of Western‑centric worldviews.

The push for change was spearheaded by Togo on behalf of the African Union, which championed the #CorrectTheMap campaign. Supporters argue that a more accurate visual representation could help de‑colonise curricula, shift geopolitical perception, and simply give Africa the respect it deserves.

Will every map instantly switch? Not quite. The UN resolution is non‑binding, so schools, publishers and tech firms aren’t forced to abandon Mercator tomorrow. Nonetheless, the vote may accelerate a shift that’s already underway. Google swapped its desktop interface to a 3‑D globe in 2018 (though its mobile app still defaults to Mercator), the World Bank prefers Winkel Tripel or Equal Earth for static graphics, and France announced plans to move toward the Eckert IV projection.

Togo is now in talks with UNESCO, the AU and tech giants like Google to explore how the new projection could be rolled out more widely. In short, the decision is less a ban on Mercator and more an invitation to adopt a map that reflects the planet’s true proportions – even if no flat representation can capture a sphere perfectly.