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🇮🇪 Ireland /Elections & Politics

UN adopts map reform to show continents at their true scale

From RTÉ News · () English

Translated from English and summarized by DistantNews. Read the original for the full story.

At a glance

News Named sources Approved/passed
  • The UN General Assembly approved an African-led resolution encouraging countries to adopt the Equal Earth projection, which represents continental land areas more accurately.
  • The measure won support from 164 countries, while the United States opposed it and six countries abstained.
  • Supporters say the Mercator projection visually enlarges northern regions and diminishes Africa and other equatorial areas, reinforcing inaccurate perceptions.

The world map could soon look different in classrooms, government offices and digital tools after the United Nations General Assembly backed a projection that gives Africa and other equatorial regions their actual visual weight.

The resolution, spearheaded by several African countries, received 164 votes in favour. The United States voted against it, while six countries abstained. It urges UN members to replace the traditional Mercator projection with Equal Earth, a map designed to show continental land areas in more accurate proportions.

Maps shape our understanding of the world.

· Robert DusseyTogo’s foreign minister argued that maps influence education and collective perceptions.

The Mercator map was created by Flemish cartographer Gerardus Mercator in 1569 for maritime navigation. It preserves the shapes and angles of land masses, but distorts their relative size when a three-dimensional globe is placed on a flat surface. Europe and North America appear much larger, while Africa, Latin America, South Asia and Oceania appear smaller. On the Mercator map, Greenland looks almost as large as Africa, despite Africa being vastly bigger.

They are therefore never neutral, when they present a distorted image of our planet, they risk perpetuating inaccurate representations that are passed down through generations.

· Robert DusseyDussey explained why supporters believe the map reform has educational and cultural importance.

Togo’s Foreign Minister Robert Dussey, who drove the initiative, said maps “shape our understanding of the world.” He argued that they influence education, imagination and collective perceptions, and warned that distorted images can pass inaccurate ideas from one generation to the next. The Equal Earth projection was launched by cartographers in 2018 and aims to preserve the relative surface areas of continents while retaining their recognizable shapes.

France, which co-sponsored the resolution, said it would abandon the Mercator projection. Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot acknowledged that changing maps would not change the world, but called correcting a distorted representation “an act of truth.” The initiative comes as France seeks to improve relations with African countries, particularly former colonies with which it has complicated ties.

Changing maps obviously doesn't change the world. But correcting a distorted representation is already an act of truth.

· Jean-Noël BarrotFrance’s foreign minister supported replacing the Mercator projection.
About this summary

Originally published by RTÉ News in English. Translated, summarized, and contextualized automatically by DistantNews, with a note on how the source frames the story. Not individually reviewed before publishing. How this works.

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