Back in primary school we were taught that Africa is the second largest continent in the world after Asia, but there seems to be a discrepancy between the data for area and illustrated size. Countries in the North appear larger than usual and countries near the Equator appear smaller than anticipated. This is the problem with the Mercator projection, presented in year 1596, which is used in schools all over.

Take a country like Russia for instance, if you Google the distance between St Petersburg (a city in the far West) and Uelen (a city in the Pacific East coast) you get 5900km, and for Africa if you Google the distance between Dakar, Senegal (a city in West Atlantic) and the Gulf of Aden (Indian Ocean) you get 7050km... This distance is called an airline (the shortest distance between two points on the earth's surface). Even high altitude photos from space show that Africa is wider than Russia.

To correct this, since 2017, public schools in Boston United States have been using a different map, the Gall Peter's projection. Which stretches Africa longitudinally (making it longer) but still didn't cater for the cross distance between Dakar and Gulf of Aden.

An ideal map for education is one which illustrates Africa in true scale both vertically and across. Help us put Africa on the map, thank you!