Mr Go reckons that urbanisation could be as low as 25%, based on data from the Global Rural Urban Mapping Project, a global population map.

ECONOMIST: Food and stability in North Korea

Turkey fears that Iraqi Kurds, who set up an autonomous administration in northern Iraq after the 1991 Gulf war, might use the fall of Saddam Hussein's regime as a pretext for setting up a Kurdish state, thereby encouraging similar sentiments among Turkey's extensive Kurdish population (see map).

ECONOMIST: Caught in the crossfire

It is rolling out here where there is wealth of online map resources and a population quite savvy in the use of online maps.

FORBES: Here's a Thought: Google's Map Maker Could be Businesses' Long-Awaited Yelp Killer

The problem is that the government has to cut the assisted-areas map down from covering 34% of Britain's population to covering 29%.

ECONOMIST: Regional aid

After the Asian tsunami ESRI India set up, for free, a center in Cuddalore in Tamil Nadu in the south to map the villages that were affected and offered information on the population of each village and the damage sustained.

FORBES: Map Mania

In South Africa's Kruger park, for example, 120 rangers whose main job is deterring poachers employ CyberTrackers to record and map the damage done to trees by the park's burgeoning elephant population.

ECONOMIST: A new device puts an old skill to work

Skyhook has amassed a database of 50 billion scanned records of Wi-Fi, cellular tower and GPS signals--a "map" of locations that captures 80% of the U.S. population.

FORBES: Technology