UN votes to adopt new world map that reflects Africa’s true size

The widely-used Mercator map is often criticised for visually exaggerating and centralising Western nations.

People stand beside a sculpture of the African continent at the Place du Souvenir Africain in Dakar, Senegal on September 3, 2026 [File: Misper Apawu/Reuters]

The United Nations has voted to adopt a new world map that more accurately reflects countries’ true sizes, a resolution sponsored by African states to right a centuries-old wrong.

The “Correct the Map” resolution adopted by the UN general assembly on Friday aims to address a colonial-era injustice that has visually shrunk Africa for 450 years, shaping how the continent is perceived in media, education and policy around the world.

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The resolution, put forward by African Union (AU) member states and the Bahamas, was backed by a vote of 164-1 with six abstentions.

Togo led the AU’s campaign to limit use of the widely-used Mercator map.

Developed in the 16th century by Flemish cartographer Gerardus Mercator, the projection distorts the relative size of land masses by expanding those nearer the poles. For instance, it makes Greenland appear roughly the same size as Africa, even though Africa is about 14 times larger.

Some critics of the Mercator map believe it remains widely used because it visually exaggerates and centralises Western nations, perpetuating ideas of European superiority.

“A fair world begins with a fair map,” Togo’s Foreign Minister Robert Dussey told the Reuters news agency ahead of Friday’s vote.

The resolution promotes the Equal Earth projection, which more accurately portrays the size of the continents.

The resolution is not legally binding and it “in no way challenges the use of the Mercator projection for maritime and aerial navigation, for which it remains fully suited,” the Togolese ministry said in a statement.

The United States – the only country to vote against the resolution – said it promoted an “ideological agenda” and was a distraction from the “genuine problems of international peace, prosperity or good relations”.

Moky Makura, executive director of the advocacy organisation Africa No Filter that’s involved in “Correct the World” map campaign, hailed the vote, saying “now the real work begins”.

“We want to see accurate maps in schools, textbooks, newsrooms, businesses and on the digital platforms billions of people use every day,” Makura said in a statement.

“If we got something as basic as Africa’s size wrong for this long, what else about Africa have we simply accepted without questioning? Africa doesn’t need to be made bigger. It needs to be seen accurately,” she added.

‘Distortions eventually take root in perceptions’

Ahead of the vote, France, who co-sponsored the resolution, announced that it planned to abandon the Mercator map.

The foreign ministry “will abandon the Mercator projection in favour of map representations tailored to specific uses, more faithful to actual surface areas and in line with the recommendations of cartographers and scientists”, French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot said in a speech at the Sorbonne University in Paris.

“The United States, Russia and China take on a disproportionate visual prominence compared to Africa, Latin America or southeast Asia,” Barrot said, adding that “distortions eventually take root in perceptions” and that “the time has come to correct them.”

The Mercator map remains widely used in classrooms, but Togo hopes to change its school geography materials by the end of the year, Dussey told Reuters.

Togo will press other governments, schools, international organisations and technology companies to move away from the Mercator map in favour of the Equal Earth one, Dussey said.

Dussey linked the campaign to adopt the map to wider African efforts to confront colonial-era legacies, while saying it was not an attack on Europe or any other civilisation.

The Mercator map’s widespread use is a consequence of colonisation, he said.

“The world is changing. Africa also is changing.”

广泛使用的墨卡托投影地图经常因在视觉上夸大和集中西方国家而受到批评。

2026年9月3日，人们站在塞内加尔达喀尔非洲纪念广场的非洲大陆雕塑旁。[图片：Misper Apawu/路透社]

联合国投票通过了一张新的世界地图，该地图更准确地反映了各国的真实面积。这项决议由非洲国家发起，旨在纠正几个世纪以来的错误。

联合国大会周五通过的“修正地图”决议旨在解决殖民时代遗留下来的不公正现象，这种不公正现象导致非洲在视觉上缩小了450年，影响着世界各地媒体、教育和政策对非洲大陆的看法。

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列表 3/3：谷歌地图根据特朗普关于“美国湖”的法令重新命名安大略湖

该决议由非洲联盟（非盟）成员国和巴哈马提出，以 164 票赞成、1 票反对、6 票弃权获得通过。

多哥领导了非盟限制广泛使用的墨卡托投影地图的运动。

这种投影方式由16世纪佛兰德制图师杰拉杜斯·墨卡托发明，它通过放大靠近两极的陆地来扭曲陆地的相对大小。例如，它使格陵兰岛看起来与非洲大致相同大小，尽管非洲的面积大约是格陵兰岛的14倍。

一些批评墨卡托地图的人认为，它仍然被广泛使用，是因为它在视觉上夸大和集中了西方国家，从而延续了欧洲优越论。

“一个公平的世界始于一张公平的地图，”多哥外交部长罗伯特·杜西在周五投票前告诉路透社。

该决议提倡采用“地球等大投影”，这种投影方式能更准确地描绘各大洲的大小。

多哥交通部在一份声明中表示，该决议不具有法律约束力，“丝毫不质疑墨卡托投影在海事和航空导航中的应用，它仍然完全适用于这些领域”。

美国是唯一一个投票反对该决议的国家，称该决议宣扬“意识形态议程”，分散了人们对“国际和平、繁荣或良好关系等真正问题的关注”。

参与“纠正世界”地图运动的倡导组织“非洲无滤镜”的执行董事莫基·马库拉对投票结果表示欢迎，他说：“现在真正的工作开始了”。

“我们希望在学校、教科书、新闻编辑室、企业以及数十亿人每天使用的数字平台上看到准确的地图，” Makura 在一份声明中说。

“如果我们连非洲面积这么基本的概念都搞错了这么久，那么关于非洲的其他事情，我们还有哪些不加质疑地接受了呢？非洲不需要被夸大，而是需要被准确地看待，”她补充道。

“扭曲最终会在认知中扎根。”

在投票前，该决议的共同发起国法国宣布计划放弃墨卡托投影地图。

法国外交部长让-诺埃尔·巴罗在巴黎索邦大学的演讲中表示，外交部“将放弃墨卡托投影，转而采用更符合实际面积、更贴近实际用途、更符合制图师和科学家建议的地图表示方法”。

巴罗特说：“与非洲、拉丁美洲或东南亚相比，美国、俄罗斯和中国在视觉上显得格外突出。”他还补充说，“这种扭曲最终会在人们的认知中扎根”，“现在是时候纠正这些认知了”。

杜西告诉路透社，墨卡托投影地图在课堂上仍然被广泛使用，但多哥希望在今年年底前更换学校的地理教材。

杜西表示，多哥将敦促其他国家政府、学校、国际组织和科技公司放弃使用墨卡托投影地图，转而使用平等地球地图。

杜西将采用该地图的运动与非洲为对抗殖民时代遗留问题而做出的更广泛努力联系起来，同时表示这不是对欧洲或任何其他文明的攻击。

他说，墨卡托地图的广泛使用是殖民化的结果。

世界在变化，非洲也在变化。