Advisory: Mauritius Discontinues Daylight Saving Time in 2009

There will be no daylight saving time (DST) in Mauritius in 2009 despite positive reports from a recent DST trial, which began in October 2008 and ended in March 2009. Mauritius’ government announced that it would not repeat last year’s DST trial. Microsoft Windows provides a way to prevent machines from switching into DST by un-checking the “Automatically adjust the clock for Daylight Saving Time” box in the Date and Time window.

 

Alternatively, customers in Mauritius can switch their computers to the “Arabian Standard Time” time zone with a display name of “(GMT+04:00) Abu Dhabi, Muscat” or the “Georgian Standard Time” time zone with a display name of “(GMT+04:00) Tbilisi”. These time zones have a bias of UTC +4 which is the same as Mauritius standard time bias and does not observe DST.

 

Microsoft's product teams are moving to a regular rhythm to update their products and services to reflect these time changes. For each update release, Microsoft accepts change requests at up to a few months prior to the release date. Please refer to Microsoft's Policy in Response to DST/TZ Requests, providing recommendations in order to achieve more seamless transitions to new DST and time zones policies. We suggest that governments should provide the following when considering changing DST or making adjustments to time zones:

1. Ample advance notice (1 year or more) of the planned change.

2. Official published confirmation of planned changes to DST or time zones.

3. Concentrated efforts on promoting the change to the affected citizens.

 

Important notes for governments:

 

    * Please refer to Microsoft's Policy in Response to DST/TZ Requests. It's important for countries and territories to work towards seamless transitions to new DST and time zones policies, providing ample advance notice (of a year or more) with published confirmation of planned changes.