Russia switches to permanent 'summer time'

[News_Editor]

Russia switches to permanent 'summer time'

2011-03-27 17:20:07 GMT+7 (ICT)

MOSCOW, RUSSIA (BNO NEWS) -- Russians set their clocks one hour forward for perhaps the last time on early Sunday morning, effectively making daylight saving time permanent in its nine timezones.

Russia has been using season time on and off during the last century, starting in 1917 when the country first introduced summer time. But in June 1930, the Soviet Union decided to make summer time permanent, putting the country one hour ahead of its normal time zone.

Decades later, in 1981, Russia again decided to introduce summer and winter time and has been using it ever since. But President Dmitry Medvedev believes it has no economic benefits and said studies showed it also has negative health effects, therefore ordering to abolish daylight saving time.

"I have decided to cancel the winter time transition this fall," Medvedev said earlier this year. "From now on we will not go off daylight saving time. We'll only have to go through this one more time, including the unpleasant loss of an hour of sleep during the spring transition. This will no longer be a problem and we'll enjoy longer daylight."

Medvedev said he had been asked about season time on numerous occasions and said the government had been researching its benefits and side-effects. "Everybody hates it [..] and everybody becomes irritated. People either oversleep or wake up too early and don't know what to do with the extra hour," he said.

The number of timezones in Russia was also recently reduced from 11 to 9 and the Russian government is investigating whether it can eliminate more timezones in the country, sparking protests in some regions.

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