Togo, which became an independent republic in 1960, was mapped by the French Institut Géographique National (IGN) and its predecessors in the 1950s and 1960s in its program of Cartes de l’Afrique de l’Ouest. The country was covered by 90 four-color, 1:50,000 scale sheets, showing relief by 20 m interval contours, and also by 12 four or five-color 1:200,000 scale sheets with 40 m contours. Both series were on a UTM projection, Clarke 1880 ellipsoid, and were compiled from aerial photographic coverage. The responsible mapping authority is now the Direction de La Cartographie Nationale et du Cadastre (DCNC), Lomé, but it is heavily dependent on overseas aid. Consequently there has been no revision of the 1:50,000 scale mapping. However a new triangulation of the country has taken place with aid from Germany, and in the 1980s a new 1:200,000 series in five extended sheets was completed, financed by France and printed at the IGN. This map is in four or five colors with relief shading and 40 m contours. Projection is UTM, Clarke 1880 ellipsoid.
Soviet military topographic mapping of Togo exists at the following scales: 1:1,000,000 (3 sheets, complete coverage, published in 1986); 1:500,000 (5 sheets, complete coverage, published 1983-1985); 1:200,000 (18 sheets, complete coverage, published 1981-1985) and a city (1:10,000) topographic map of Lome published in 1978. These products are available in print, digital raster and digital vector GIS formats from East View Geospatial.
The Direction Générale des Mines, de la Géologie et du Bureau National de Recherches Minières (DGMG), Lomé, also undertook new mapping in the 1980s. A five-sheet 1:200,000 scale geological map was issued in 1984-86 with accompanying texts, together with a single 1:500,000 scale sheet of the whole country.
Soil mapping of Togo was undertaken by the Institut Français de Recherche Scientifique pour le Développement en Coopération (ORSTOM). A map of the whole country at 1:1,000,000 scale was published in 1962, and a three-sheet map at 1:200,000 scale in 1979. Further work in the 1980s produced a two-sheet 1:50,000 soil map of Kara in northeast Togo, issued with a 282-page monograph, and 1:100,000 scale maps of soil and land capability for the Région de Bassar. In 1993, a 1:500,000 morphopedologic map was issued covering the extreme north of the country. In 1996, ORSTOM published a map of the state of land degradation in the country assessed on a scale of six classes.
A useful atlas in the Jeune Afrique series was published in 1981 by Editions du Jaguar. Its preparation was directed by the Département de Géographie, Université du Bénin at Lomé.
A 1:20,000 map of the capital, Lomé, was published in 1977, and a new edition appeared in 1980.
The Direction de la Statistique et de l’Informatique (CENETI) carries out a decennial census of population and has produced 1:50,000 to 1:100,000 scale maps of the 21 prefectures, and detailed plans of cities printed as dye-lines.
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