Anong oras na? Sync your watch to the official PHL Standard Time

By KIM LUCES, GMA News

Published December 21, 2013 4:09pm

Sync your watches. The official time of the Philippines is now regulated or held by the PAGASA Time Service Unit. Government offices, private corporations, and all television and radio stations are now required to follow the said official time.

The Philippine Standard Time Act of 2013 or RA 10535 was officially implemented yesterday, December 20, 15 days after the Implementing Rules and Regulations (IRR) were published.

“(Ang IRR) ay nalathala na sa dalawang periodiko noong December 5, at ito'y magkakabisa labinlimang araw pagkatapos nito,” said Valenzuela City 2nd District Representative and principal author of RA10535, Cong. Magtanggol Gunigundo I said in a press conference, Friday.

According to the new law, government agencies, as well as the private sector, are now required to display the Philippine Standard Time (PhST) sourced from PAGASA, the official time keeper of the country.

Among those required to display the PhST are:

-National government agencies including State Universities and Colleges (SUCs), and Government-Owned and Controlled Corporations (GOCCs)

-Local Government Units

-Government television stations and radio stations

-Private corporations and agencies

-People's organizations, non-government organizations and civil society groups

-Airports, seaports, expressways, government electronic boards, and similar establishments

At least once a month, all of these offices shall coordinate with PAGASA's Time Service Unit to synchronize their official timepieces and devices. Owners of private television and radio stations who fail to broadcast the PhST face a penalty fine of P30,000 to P50,000.

Local telecommunications network time also follows the PhST, even if they are not mandated by law to do so, said DOST assistant secretary Raymund Liboro.

“The deviation between telco GPS enabled network time and the PAGASA network time is just around two seconds which is within the tolerable range,” he said in a text message to GMA News Online.

“They committed to comply just like the rest of the broadcast stations. In fact, they've been compliant since their very systems use the same basis for PhST.”

Users who want to sync their phones' time with the PhST just have to activate the “Automatic date and time” option in their mobile units. The law also institutionalized the National Time Consciousness Week which will be celebrated every first week of the year. In 2014, it will be celebrated from January 1 to 7.

Aside from aiming to “to sync all time devices in the country”, the Philippine Standard Time also aims “to modify the so-called 'Filipino time' attitude and develop the habit of being punctual as a show of respect to other people and to the value of time”, according to a DOST information sheet.

“We have to be productive as (citizens) and as a country. That is one common trait of people in rich countries. Aside from being conscious (with savings), they are also very punctual,” Gunigundo said.

The need for synchronized time in the past has become the impetus for eventual standardization.

For example, in 1849, the use of railroad transport in that era was on the ascent, as was the number of rail accidents and train wrecks.

“The crashes killed people, and the public was grumbling that the railroads were cutting corners. To the railroads, though, the problem wasn’t money, but time,” an article from the Harvard Gazette reported.

There were too many time standards being followed because train conductors “set their clocks by the time at their main departure station”, the Harvard Gazette said. The stations meanwhile got their time by “marking the stars or the sun's passage in the sky”, it added.

This inevitably led to time discrepancies in different places. Collisions arose when too many lines only had a single track with trains traveling in both directions.

“Knowing where another train was, and when it would pass, allowed conductors and engineers to pull their train onto a siding to avoid colliding. But the proliferation of trains and times made train wrecks more common, with 97 between 1831 and 1853,” the same report continued.

To sovle this, the railroads eventually decided to run according to a single time keeper, giving birth to the conceot of “standard time.”

“Starting in 1849 and for the next 43 years, a time signal originating in the Harvard College Observatory not only let New England’s trains run more safely, but also created what was in effect the first American time zone,” the article said. — KDM, GMA News

Tags: philippinestandardtime, pagasa