Shift to electric
PAKISTAN’S cooking fuel economy is under pressure from global gas shocks. The Israel-Iran conflict has disrupted LNG shipments through the Strait of Hormuz, and Qatar — the world’s second-largest LNG exporter — has declared force majeure on its gas plants. Nearly all of Pakistan’s LNG imports come from Qatar, and Senate briefings warned of cuts in March shipments and possible disruptions in April. Although officials have said households will be prioritised, the disruption underscores the vulnerability of any household energy system built on insecure imported fuels to geopolitical shocks beyond the control of ordinary citizens.
Yet Pakistan’s cooking crisis did not begin with this war. For years, domestic gas reserves have been shrinking. In 2021, the government banned new household gas connections amid depleting reserves, leaving many households reliant on pricey LPG cylinders or solid fuels. Although the ban was lifted last year, prior restrictions mean many developments, including high-end residential sectors such as DHA Islamabad, still lack gas lines. This marks a structural shift: piped gas can no longer be treated as the inevitable cooking fuel of Pakistan’s urban future. For many homes, electric stoves may present the only clean cooking pathway if gas remains scarce.
This fragility exists within an already unequal cooking landscape. According to the World Bank’s Pakistan Energy Survey, about 55.7 per cent of households rely on traditional or open-fire stoves as their primary cooking source, especially in the rural areas, while 33.8pc use collected wood. Only about 44pc of households cook with clean fuels (38.6pc use piped gas, 5.7pc LPG). The current LNG shocks therefore risk reinforcing existing energy poverty.
The emerging case for electric cooking: This situation shows why electric cooking deserves serious attention now. Not because it can replace gas for everyone overnight, but because the conditions that once made it seem unrealistic have changed dramatically.
In 2021, according to the UK aid-funded Modern Energy Cooking Services Programme’s Global Market Assessment, Pakistan ranked 83rd out of 130 countries on electric cooking readiness (compared to India at ninth place).
By 2023, Pakistan had moved up to 63rd position. Although this does not make Pakistan a leading market, it does show movement. More importantly, the country of today is not the country of 2021. Reuters has reported that rooftop solar has surged to more than 20 GW across Pakistan, while 74pc of electricity generation comes from domestic sources. What looked marginal a few years ago now looks increasingly strategic.
Could electric cooking be Pakistan’s answer to a war-driven gas crisis?
There is also growing evidence that the appliance market is beginning to catch up. Retailers such as Carrefour and Al-Fatah list induction and infrared stoves from Rs4,000 to over Rs15,000. Daraz carries multiple electric stoves, some with instalment plans, while Lahore Centre explicitly advertises “easy instalment plans” on hot plates. This matters since electric cooking cannot scale if appliances remain niche, inaccessible or incompatible with cooking needs. Their growing visibility in mainstream retail and e-commerce suggests that an urban consumer market is emerging.
The electric-cooking market has been developing even more rapidly across South Asia. Reuters reported that Indian induction sales increased 30 times in March amid gas shortages. India launched its National Efficient Cooking Programme in 2023 to subsidise induction stoves, targeting the distribution of two million to reduce LPG reliance. Nepal aims to raise the share of households cooking primarily with electricity from 0.5pc to 25pc by 2030.
Bangladesh has trialled carbon financing, whereby ATEC’s ‘Cook-to-Earn’ pilot pays women for each kilowatt hour of electric cooking used, yielding a 38pc to 56pc jump in stove usage. These examples show that when gas supplies tighten, electric cooking can gain traction if appliances and financing are available. In Pakistan too, necessity has often driven household energy innovation — first through UPS systems during early load-shedding, and more recently through rooftop solar. Electric cooking may well follow a similar path.
Towards a viable and fair transition: Still, the transition to electric cooking will require a strategic effort. The most feasible shift is likely among middle- and upper-income urban households, especially those already benefiting from rooftop solar. Pakistan’s residential solar boom can act as a key enabler, allowing households with solar panels to run induction stoves at near-zero marginal cost during daylight hours. Better-off flat-owners also typically have three-phase power and modern wiring, making installation easier.
Recent data shows about 39pc of Pakistanis live in urban areas with near-universal electricity access. However, for lower-income households, renters, residents of informal settlements and many rural communities, the situation is more challenging. The latest Household Integrated Economic Survey shows that electricity already accounts for the largest share of household fuel and lighting expenditure (55.91pc), and the shift towards modern fuels rises sharply with income. Left entirely to the market, electric cooking could thus deepen inequality rather than reduce it.
The question, then, is not whether electric cooking is the future — it almost certainly is. The real issue is whether Pakistan will shape that transition deliberately or allow it to unfold unevenly and by default. A serious response would include targeted appliance finance, dedicated electric cooking tariffs, links to rooftop solar packages, quality and safety standards and pilots for low-income communities backed by concessional or carbon finance.
Pakistan’s gas crisis should be seen not only as a shortage challenge; it’s also an opportunity for transition. The old assumption that cooking gas would continue expanding quietly into new homes and future transitions no longer holds. Electric cooking will not solve every problem, and it will not do so for everyone at once. But in a country experiencing a rooftop solar boom, mounting gas insecurity and renewed pressure for self-sufficient energy systems, it may now offer one of the clearest pathways towards a more resilient cooking future.
The writer is a senior research associate at the MECS programme, Loughborough University, UK.
Published in Dawn, April 8th, 2026
