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September 5, 2026 — UN General Assembly

The world map just changed. So did Africa.

For over a century, the Mercator projection made Africa look barely bigger than Greenland. That's no longer the standard. Here's what actually changed, what it really means — and a free poster to download.

Before — Mercator

The standard projection since 1569, still used on most online maps.

After — Eckert IV

Equal-area projection adopted by France for its official maps.

×14

On Mercator, Greenland (2.17M km²) looks about the same size as Africa. In reality, Africa (30.4M km²) is roughly 14 times bigger.

What happened on September 5, 2026

The United Nations General Assembly adopted a resolution — “Correcting the Map” — by 164 votes to 1 (the United States), with 6 abstentions. The text isn't binding: it doesn't ban Mercator, it encourages governments, schools and digital platforms to adopt equal-area projections like Equal Earth, which more faithfully represent the real proportions of continents.

The same day, French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot announced that France would drop Mercator for its diplomatic maps in favor of the Eckert IV projection (1906) — a different choice from Equal Earth, but one that corrects the same distortion.

Why Koush is talking about this

Koush exists for the same reason as this resolution: Africa has long been minimized in the representations that matter — maps, but also tech directories, AI search engines, professional databases. An African founder exists, their app exists, but nowhere can an AI find them when asked. That's the gap Koush fills, one listing at a time.

Sources

↓ Download the free PDF poster List your app on Koush