Miss a day, gain much more: Samoa moves the international dateline

Samoa is a South Pacific island (population 200,000), formerly called Western Samoa, situated on the eastern side of the International Date Line, making it the last country on Earth to end the day. This means that it is a day behind Australia, New Zealand, Asia, and other Pacific countries – Samoa’s trading partners – restricting the country to a three-day business week. It lies south of the equator about halfway between New Zealand and Hawaii (and is about the size of two of Hawaii’s islands, Oahu and Maui combined).

Samoa was placed this side of the international dateline almost 120 years ago when its trading partners were Europe and the United States of America. Samoa’s parliament passed legislation on Monday June 27, 2011, to reverse the decision on December 30, so that the international dateline lies to the east of the country, bringing it in line with Australasia. Therefore, this year, Friday December 30 won’t exist. The country will literally miss a day to enable the alignment – finishing Thursday December 29 and waking to December 31.

Samoans are generally in favour of the decision and those having an anniversary on December 30 will only miss out this year as December 30 will be back on the calendar in 2012. The official registrar indicates that 767 births and 43 marriages were registered on that date.

An official from the tiny New Zealand territory of Tokelau, which lies to the north of Samoa and has a population of less than 1,500, said it would probably follow Samoa's lead and also skip December 30. Samoa gained its independence from New Zealand in 1962 and was admitted to the United Nations in 1976. In July 1997, the constitution was amended to change the country's name from Western Samoa to Samoa. The U.S. territory of American Samoa protested and still refers to the country as Western Samoa. [American Samoa will remain unchanged and will continue to lie east of the dateline.]

Missing a day will result in the country being three hours ahead of Sydney, Australia, instead of 21 hours behind. The volcanic country is traditionally dependent on agriculture and fishing at the local level, as well as the manufacturing of agricultural products. Tourism is also an increasing source of income. Moving the International Date Line will also make it one of the first countries to start the day.

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