International ยท Priscilla Asante
What different world maps got right and what they got wrong
The United Nation, UN has called for the predominant world map to be replaced with one that accurately reflects the true size of continents such as Africa.
The Correct Map resolution adopted by the General Assembly aims to fix discrepancy with the Mercator map, in which African continent is shown as being of similar size to Greenland, even though it is in reality about 14 times larger.
The UN adopted a new map, the Equal Earth projection, which better represents the true sizes of landmasses but comes with problems of its own. There have been many prominent attempts over the years to solve the problem of accurately representing the surface of a sphere on a flat rectangle, each with its own benefits and drawbacks.
The now widely used Mercator map was created in 1569 by Flemish cartographer Gerardus Mercator. A cartography, Professor James Cheshire, at the University College London explained that its main purpose was to help European sailors navigate the oceans.
He told British Broadcasting Corporation, BBC that, he wanted a straight line to be drawn on a map to look like a straight line in reality following a compass bearing.
His map accommodates for the curvature of the Earth by making countries near the equator seem much smaller than they are and countries nearer the poles appear stretched.
The distortion is as a result of it being impossible to accurately represent the surface of a globe on a two-dimensional chart. More than four hundred and 50 years on, Mercator's creation is still the basis for many of the maps that is seen in classrooms, on TV and online, including Google Maps.
But critics of the Mercator map say, there is a psychological effect to viewing some places as smaller than they actually are and others as larger, as human instinctively view bigger things as more important.
A Kenyan geographer, Kioko Muendo, told BBC that this has indirectly downplayed Africa's vast resources, population and investment opportunities.
Maps are more than just guides for travelers as they shape how regions are perceived politically and economically, The Equal Earth map he noted, aims to address this problem with the Mercator projection.
It was developed by a team of cartographers in 2018 to present the size and shape of landmasses more accurately, and was inspired by the 1963 Robinson projection, a map that shows the entire globe's surface at once.
As a result, the Equal Earth map was adopted by African Union members in February, before it was adopted by the UN.