Luxor4u

Clocks will go back one hour during Ramadan, a cabinet spokesperson announced via Facebook on Friday.

The time change, which reduces daylight hours, will last from 27 June until 1 August.

In April 2011, the cabinet headed by prime minister Essam Sharaf endorsed a decree cancelling daylight saving time.

Daylight saving time was first adopted in Egypt in 1988 as a way to reduce electricity consumption. The energy ministry later submitted a study to the cabinet showing the move had no impact on energy consumption.

In Egypt, standard time is GMT (UTC)+2. Daylight saving time is GMT+3.

I remember saying back in 2011, when the decree to cancel daylight saving time was issued, that it would all change again when Ramadan fell in summer months. I was told by many I was wrong, they would never change it again!

How it reduces daylight hours is beyond me though. There are still 24hrs in a day and X amount of daylight hours depending on the time of year. Whether you sleep through some of them or not is another matter, but it should not actually affect the number of hours anyone fasts - unless I've misunderstood that too. I'm not even convinced it helps reduce the fasting hours during the hottest part of the day.

It will be interesting to see if the government improve the hours that electricity and water are cut for many across Egypt during the month of Ramadan too to coincide better with daylight saving hours!

This will not bother me, as I couldn't be bothered to change them in the first instance, so I'm, and my clocks, are ready when they are.

As I think it was observed at the time, the majority of the people are governed by the daylight and the timing of the morning and evening prayers. It does not matter what time it is but when the sun physically rises and sets.

Our friend's horses expect their last feed as the sun goes down and the call to prayer starts.