President Dmitry Medvedev cut the number of time zones in the world's largest country from 11 to nine in March. Now the Industry and Trade Ministry wants to find out whether the change is helping boost the economy as Medvedev promised. The problem, however, is that the ministry cannot find anyone to calculate the impact of the change — and the clock is ticking rapidly. The Industry and Trade Ministry last month issued a public tender worth 18 million rubles ($580,000) for scientists to carry out wide-ranging research on the country's time zones, but no one has applied, Nikolai Novikov, deputy head of the ministry's regulations and measurement standards department, said Tuesday. It is the ministry's second attempt to find candidates after a first in March failed.
Time is of the essence because this tender will probably be the last. The tender closes at 10 a.m. Thursday after running exactly one month. If no bidder appears by then, the money earmarked for the project is likely to be reassigned within the ministry, Novikov told The Moscow Times. "By law, we can find scientists only by tender. We cannot order anybody to conduct research," he said, adding that a third tender would probably be pointless because the research had to be finished by the end of the year and there would not be enough time for a winner to do that. The fact that ministries get a set amount every year that they are required to spend on scientific research has led to dubious results in the past. The Transportation Ministry earlier this year announced a 3 million ruble study to clarify the functions of the Transportation Ministry. But in this case the lack of interest could mean that Medvedev's initiative to reduce the country's time zones will be conducted without much feedback from the population.
Russia shed the two time zones when five regions — Kamchatka, Chukotka, Kemerovo, Samara and Udmurtia — shifted one hour closer to Moscow as daylight saving time was introduced this March. Medvedev has said more adjustments of time zones are necessary to boost economic growth, and the Industry and Trade Ministry's research proposal should help government officials decide on how to carry them out, Novikov explained. First Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov said in April that a final decision on changing time zones would be made this fall, after the effects of the changes introduced in March are examined. Part of the ministry project would be to conduct polls in the regions to establish the popularity of time zone changes and a possible abolition of daylight saving time, Novikov said. Other aspects would be to establish how mismatches between solar time and official time affect public health and energy efficiency.
Novikov said the task might seem too daunting to potential researchers. "Obviously this is a big project, but we still hope someone will come forward," he said. The research project is also supposed to help ministry officials work on a new federal law that covers all aspects of time — from its definition of time zones to daylight-saving time. Novikov dismissed national media reports that mocked a 1,600-word bill, published on the ministry's web site earlier this month, because it stipulates, among other things, that a minute consists of 60 seconds and that every year has 12 months. "This may sound funny, but any such law has to define the simple things it is based on," he said. The real aim, he said, is to fill a big gap in the country's legal system. "The problem is that with regard to time, we currently have a full-fledged legal vacuum," Novikov said.
He explained that there is no legal definition of the country's time zone borders, nor a fixed principle on how to change them. "There are regions like Astrakhan that trace their regulations to decrees dating from the Stalin era," he said. He said the law would just provide the legal framework, leaving decisions like whether to keep daylight saving or which time zone would apply to each region to federal or regional authorities. Introduced in the Soviet Union in 1981, daylight saving time has remained widely unpopular in Russia. Medvedev has promised to consider scrapping it but cautioned that this could isolate the country from the rest of Europe.
Author: Nikolaus von Twickel
