Time zone

Poland is the central point of Europe. This is demonstrated not only by the fact that our country contains the geographic centre of the continent (at Suchowola in Podlasie), but by the time we use – Central European.

Points lying on the same line of longitude have the same local time, but every change of position causes a change in time. When people began to travel around at faster speeds, this became inconvenient. Therefore, based on an idea of the Canadian Sandford Fleming, the world was divided into 24 time zones.

The time used in Poland is Central European Time, which is the solar time at a longitude of 15 degrees east. This line of longitude runs west of Jelenia Gora and Zielona Gora and east of Szczecin. In any case, this is the position in winter, or more precisely, from the last Sunday of October until the last Sunday in March.

In summer, we change to Eastern European Time. In accordance with a directive in force throughout the European Union, at 1 am GMT (which is 2 am in Poland) on the last Sunday of March, we put our clocks forward one hour, and on the last Sunday in October, they go one hour back.

The pioneer of summer time was Benjamin Franklin. However, his article proposing that people go to bed and get up earlier was taken as a joke. Summer time was first introduced by the Germans during World War I – on 30 April 1916, they put their clocks forward an hour, putting them back by the same amount on 1 October. Soon, Great Britain began to do the same, followed in 1918 by the USA. In Poland, summer time was first introduced in the inter-war period.

The main advantage of the time changes is the electricity saved on lighting. These benefits diminish during the four darkest months of the year (November to February), so in winter, we go back to standard time, which in Poland, as in most of Europe, is Central European Time.