Pakistan Faces Severe Spectrum Shortage, Ranks Lowest in the Region

the country’s kinda playing catch-up when it comes to spectrum. Saudi Arabia’s flexing with 1200 MHz, and even Thailand and Bangladesh are cruising along with 600 MHz each. Meanwhile, here? Not quite there yet.

So yeah, the crunch is real. The government finally woke up and decided, “Hey, maybe we should auction off some 5G spectrum before everyone’s internet turns into a potato.” The Frequency Allocation Board has already tossed some spectrum into the ring, with this Auction Advisory Committee watching over things like a bunch of hall monitors.

PTA kicked off the auction idea back in 2023, but things didn’t exactly move at lightning speed. Fast-forward to November 2024—they brought in some international hotshots to crunch the numbers, figure out how much the spectrum’s actually worth, and come up with a game plan for the auction. About time, honestly.

Well, here’s the deal: PTA’s own docs are hyping up 5G like it’s the second coming. They’re throwing around numbers, saying rolling out 5G could jack up Pakistan’s GDP by somewhere between 1.5% and 2.4%. Not too shabby, right? Plus, we’re talking a possible 3% to 13% bump in jobs, which, honestly, sounds like a lifeline with youth unemployment doing its thing.

And get this—just a 10% boost in people using mobile broadband could give the whole economy a shot in the arm. More people glued to their phones, more money flying around. Simple math.

The docs also claim that just making more spectrum available could reel in about 2% more foreign direct investment. Exports, too—they might jump up by almost 2%, which, hey, every bit counts. Meanwhile, 101 other countries are already living in the future with 5G, while Pakistan is still stuck buffering. Not exactly the leaderboard you wanna be at the bottom of, you know?

Man, Pakistan’s way down at the bottom of the list when it comes to spectrum allocation—like, dead last out of 16 countries in the area. But hey, PTA’s got some numbers that sound a bit more hopeful. If this upcoming spectrum auction goes well (fingers crossed), they say Pakistan could shoot up to sixth place. Not too shabby, right?