Mexico City – With 445 votes in favor, 33 abstentions and 8 against, Mexico’s Chamber of Deputies approved President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s proposal to eliminate Daylight Savings Time. The initiative now goes to the Senate for discussion and vote and, if endorsed, will come into effect on October 30.
“In the national territory there will be a standard schedule that will be established in accordance with the time zones (…) A seasonal schedule (daylight savings time) will only be applied in states and municipalities on the northern border,” says the endorsed opinion.
In other words, the municipalities in the border area with the United States will maintain daylight savings time so as not to affect commercial exchange, so the northern border daylight savings time will take effect from 2 am on the second Sunday in March, and will end at 2:00 am on the first Sunday of November.
During a Tuesday morning press conference back in July, the president and members of his cabinet outlined the reasons for eliminating daylight savings time. The practice, they reported, does not represent substantial savings in energy and has negative effects on health.
“A study carried out by the Ministry of Energy, the Federal Electricity Commission, and the Ministry of Health concluded that the damage to health is greater than the importance of the economic savings obtained by lower consumption of energy,” the President explained.
The head of the Ministry of Energy (Sener), Rocío Nahle, reported that last June they conducted a survey on the subject and 71% of the participants said they disagree with changing the time on their clocks twice a year. “There has been a popular rejection since 1996, when this schedule was installed,” she asserted.
If the Senate approves the proposal, Mexicans who do not live in municipalities along the U.S. border will no longer advance their clocks on the first Sunday in April and turn them back on the last Sunday in October. For most of the country, the last time that clocks will be changed in Mexico will be on October 30, 2022.