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🇬🇧 United Kingdom /Culture & Society

UN to vote on adopting a new world map that shows Africa’s true scale

From The Guardian · () English

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

At a glance

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  • The UN General Assembly will vote on a Togo-sponsored resolution to phase out the Mercator map in favor of a projection that more accurately shows Africa’s size.
  • Togo’s foreign minister said the proposal has the backing of the African Union’s other 54 member states, though he did not give a total number of sponsors.

The United Nations is preparing to vote on whether to move away from the familiar Mercator map, which makes Africa appear roughly comparable in size to Greenland.

The resolution, sponsored by Togo, calls for the world to formally adopt a map that represents Africa’s actual scale more accurately. The UN General Assembly is due to vote on the proposal on Friday.

Robert Dussey, Togo’s foreign affairs minister, said the measure was backed by the other 54 members of the African Union. He did not specify the total number of countries supporting the resolution.

The traditional map depicts Africa as similar in size to Greenland

· Robert DusseyThe description of the Mercator map captures the distortion that the proposed resolution seeks to address.
About this summary

Originally published by The Guardian 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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