According to Dawn, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif announced that the country will limit power load shedding to a maximum of two hours per day. The order applies nationwide and is intended to curb the frequent, longer outages that have become a routine part of daily life for households and businesses.
Load shedding, also known as scheduled power cuts, is a tool used by electricity utilities when supply cannot meet demand. In Pakistan, the practice has been a regular feature for years, often stretching to six or eight hours in some regions. By setting a two-hour ceiling, the government is signalling a shift toward tighter control of the grid and an attempt to reduce the economic impact of power interruptions.
Why the change matters for businesses
For small and medium enterprises, an unexpected power cut can mean lost production, spoiled inventory, or missed deadlines. In South Africa, many owners have learned to plan around load shedding schedules, investing in generators or battery storage to keep the lights on. The Pakistani decision highlights a similar dilemma: without reliable electricity, operating costs rise and growth stalls.
The prime minister’s statement did not include details on how the two-hour limit will be enforced, nor did it specify whether the cap applies to all regions equally. It is therefore a claim by the government that remains to be verified by the national utility, the Pakistan Electric Power Company (PEPCO), and by independent observers.
Historically, Pakistan’s power sector has struggled with a gap between generation capacity and consumption. The country relies heavily on imported fuel for its thermal plants, and seasonal variations in water flow affect hydro-electric output. These factors have forced the utility to rotate supply, leading to the load-shedding cycles that businesses have had to accommodate.
South Africa faces a comparable set of challenges. The national grid operator, Eskom, has been forced to implement rolling blackouts when demand outstrips supply, a situation that has prompted many firms to invest in backup generators. The Pakistani move to cap daily outages at two hours may be seen as an attempt to avoid the longer, more disruptive cuts that have plagued the country, but the success of the policy will depend on whether generation can keep pace with demand.
For entrepreneurs watching the development, the key takeaway is the importance of contingency planning. Even if the policy succeeds in limiting outages, the risk of occasional overruns remains. Investing in uninterruptible power supplies, negotiating flexible delivery schedules with suppliers, or diversifying energy sources can mitigate the impact of any future grid shortfalls.
Analysts note that the announcement could also be a political signal ahead of upcoming elections, showing the government’s responsiveness to public frustration over power reliability. However, without concrete data on the current supply-demand balance, it is difficult to assess how realistic a two-hour ceiling is.
In the short term, businesses in Pakistan are likely to watch the implementation closely, while South African owners may see a reminder of why reliable power remains a strategic priority. The broader lesson is clear: when a country’s electricity system cannot meet demand, the burden falls on the private sector, which must adapt or risk losing competitiveness.
As the policy rolls out, further statements from the power utility and reports from independent monitors will be needed to confirm whether the two-hour limit is being met in practice. Until then, the announcement stands as a government claim, not yet proven on the ground.
Why a two-hour cap is a very different target to Eskom’s own
Pakistan’s new ceiling caps load shedding at two hours a day nationally, a target that only makes sense in contrast to South Africa’s own recent history, where entire days at the higher stages of load shedding meant far longer outages than that for extended periods. Eskom publishes its own generation and availability data on its data portal, which this week reported an Energy Availability Factor of 67.78%, covered separately by this site: see Eskom’s EAF report.
The comparison is instructive rather than exact, since the two countries’ generation mixes, grid sizes and demand patterns differ substantially. What the comparison does show is that a firm, published ceiling on outage length, whatever the number, functions as a public accountability commitment a utility or government can be measured against, which is precisely the kind of specific, checkable target that was missing from South Africa’s own load shedding communication for years before stage-based scheduling was introduced.
