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The UN general assembly has voted by 164 to one to retire the centuries-old Mercator projection in favour of the more accurate Equal Earth map, with only the United States opposing the resolution led by Togo and the African Union.
The United Nations general assembly has voted to adopt a resolution calling on nations and institutions worldwide to formally phase out the traditional Mercator map of the globe in favour of a projection that more accurately displays the relative sizes of the continents.
During a session held at UN headquarters in New York, 164 countries voted in favour of the resolution, which effectively retires the 16th-century Mercator projection in favour of designs based on the more accurate 2018 Equal Earth projection. The United States was the only country to vote against the measure, with its representative describing the resolution as superfluous. Six countries abstained from the vote.
Because UN resolutions are non-binding, countries and institutions will not be legally required to use only the new projection or forbidden from continuing to rely on the old one. Nevertheless, the outcome is expected to influence classroom curricula and everyday technology, given the widespread use of the Mercator projection in education, technology and governance.
Togo spearheaded the campaign for the resolution on behalf of the African Union, arguing that the Mercator projection has had lasting cognitive, educational, cultural, geopolitical and socioeconomic effects. Critics note that the projection dramatically distorts the apparent size of regions near the equator, making them look far smaller than they actually are, while exaggerating the size of high-latitude areas in the northern hemisphere.
For example, the Mercator map shows Africa as being roughly the same size as Greenland, when in reality the African continent is about 14 times larger than the Danish territory. Activists have pointed out that the United States, China, India, Japan, Mexico and much of Europe could all fit inside Africa with land to spare.
The African Union endorsed the #CorrectTheMap campaign in August 2025 and subsequently asked Togo to lead the effort to bring the resolution before the general assembly. The Mercator layout was introduced by the Flemish cartographer Gerardus Mercator in 1569 to help sailors navigate the seas, and it has remained the global standard for nearly five centuries.
Historians and geographers have long argued that the projection is rooted in western stereotypes, and some activists have coined the term cartographic colonialism to describe its distorting effect. One of the most prominent critics of the Mercator projection was the German historian Arno Peters, who launched the Peters world map based on the Gall-Peters projection in 1973 as an alternative.
Togo's campaign promoted the 2018 Equal Earth design, which was developed by an international team of cartographers and is regarded as a more faithful representation of surface areas. Before the vote, France's foreign minister Jean-Noël Barrot announced during a speech at the Sorbonne University in Paris that France will abandon the Mercator projection in favour of the Eckert IV projection, which is close to the Equal Earth design.
Togo's government is planning an event in Lomé with Unesco, the African Union and technology companies including Google Maps during the first quarter of next year to map out the implementation of the resolution
UN Mercator Projection Equal Earth Map Africa Cartographic Colonialism
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