The United Nations (UN) has decided to move away from the widely used Mercator projection.
This mapping system was created in the 16th century and has been used in textbooks and various digital services up to the present day. However, its main disadvantage is that areas located farther from the equator appear much larger than their actual size.
For example, on a Mercator map, Greenland appears almost the same size as Africa. In reality, Africa is approximately 14 times larger than Greenland.
The initiative to introduce a new mapping system was mainly supported by African countries. According to them, the old map significantly distorts people’s perception of the true size of continents.
New versions of world maps are expected to begin appearing in the coming years.
«THE ASHGABAT TIMES».
