The ability of a country to meet its wider development objectives is largely affected by access to reliable energy. In Zambia, demand for energy, in particular electricity, has been rising due to economic activity in the country, particularly in the Mining, Agriculture, Manufacturing sectors and in all other businesses in general. As a result, load shedding and unannounced power-cuts have characterized Zambia’s economy. Zambia`s business sector, both formal and informal, has not been spared and has been crippled and hit hard by electricity load shedding which is seen as a solution to the inability of the power utility to supply electricity to meet demand. Businesses and entrepreneurs are relied upon as the future engines of growth for the economy. It was therefore critical to understand the extent to which load shedding had affected this sector and how this could have affected the country`s economic development. The general objective of the study was to investigate the impact of electricity demand and load shedding on Zambian businesses and entrepreneurship. The specific objectives of the study were: (a) To establish the effects of load shedding on the Zambian business in terms of productivity and profitability. (b) To assess the measures employed and available energy alternatives the businesses depend on as the replacement to ZESCO electricity. (c) To find out how these measures have affected profitability and productivity. (d) To increase knowledge on the relationship between affordable and reliable energy sources and business growth. (e) Find out the options to mitigating the effects/ ending load shedding. The research was done in Solwezi district of North Western province of Zambia. A non probability purposive sampling approach was used, in particular the judgment sampling technique. One hundred (100) firms/ businesses falling in any of the five (5) sub-sectors categorized below were sampled. The firms or businesses that were included had to satisfy the following sampling objectives: (1) had to be a firm that use electricity and relied on ZESCO supplied electricity for its business operations or processes (2) experienced power rationing/load shedding/power cuts (3) selected out of the sub-sectors categorized in: (1) service provision (water supply, Banks and internet services/ IT Enabled Services), (2) manufacturing/welding shops/Iron & Steel, (3) food and Beverage/restaurant/tourism sector/Hotels business, (4) salons/barber shop, (5) Poultry/grain milling. The study was conducted by using self-administered questionnaires containing both closed and open questions, along with personal observation to take responses from targeted business houses. The approach relied on the individual respondent’s self-assessment method of valuing for example, the cost of electricity outage. The study demonstrated that the power rationing and load shedding embarked by ZESCO to manage the power deficit had impacted negatively on both firm`s productivity and profitability. The study also revealed that very few business firms resorted to using alternative energy sources, and employed measures in order to mitigate the effects of load shedding. The study however, established that the measures put in place to mitigate load shedding resulted in mixed effects on productivity and profitability. It was also established that lack of affordable and reliable energy sources resulting from load shedding impacted on business growth and entrepreneurship negatively. The study recommended the implementation of energy efficiency policies and measures, improved notification and strict adherence to schedules by ZESCO, ZESCO also to consider excluding business/town centre from load shedding especially during day time and instead load shed business centres at night, investment in generation capacity, need for diversification in energy, and needs concerted efforts from all stakeholders.