Libya Pumps Like It’s 2013, but Libyans See Little of It
LIBYA · ENERGY
Key Facts
—The milestone: Libya’s total oil output has reached about 1.49 million barrels per day — roughly 1.44 million of crude plus condensates — the highest since 2013, per the National Oil Corporation.
—The target: NOC chairman Masoud Suleiman wants 1.5 million bpd before the end of 2026.
—The comeback: production averaged about 1.3 million bpd in 2025, up from 1.09 million in 2024, helping real GDP rebound 12.4 percent.
—The majors return: BP, Shell and ExxonMobil have all agreed to come back to Libya, home to Africa’s largest crude reserves at about 48 billion barrels.
—The catch: ordinary Libyans see little of the boom — power cuts, cash shortages and a state split between rival governments persist.
—The politics: the country remains divided between administrations in Tripoli and the east, with oil revenue the prize both sides need.
—The frame: Libya is the loudest test of whether Africa’s petro-states can convert barrels into better lives.
Libya oil production has climbed to about 1.49 million barrels a day, its highest level since 2013, and the majors are coming back. Yet the boom is barely reaching Libyans, who still live with blackouts and a state split in two.
Libya oil production returns to 2013 levels
The National Oil Corporation says crude output has risen to roughly 1.44 million barrels per day. Condensates lift total production to about 1.49 million, the best figure in some thirteen years.
Chairman Masoud Suleiman has told staff to keep pushing toward 1.5 million bpd before the end of the year. The strategy is explicit: pump the economy back to relevance.
Even the target would leave Libya below its past self. The country pumped about 1.6 million barrels a day before the 2011 revolution toppled Muammar Gaddafi and shattered the state.
Recovery to 2013 levels therefore reads less like triumph than repair. The lost decade between those numbers is measured in revenue Libya can never claw back.
The majors walk back through the door
BP, Shell and ExxonMobil have all agreed to return to Libyan exploration and development. They are drawn by Africa’s largest crude reserves, estimated at about 48 billion barrels, and sentiment has improved as output stabilised, per S&P Global.
The returns follow Libya’s first licensing round in nearly two decades, which The Rio Times covered as the country courted majors amid instability. Cheap barrels and huge geology outweigh political risk, for now.
The field in the photograph tells the story in miniature. El Sharara, the roughly 300,000-barrel giant in the southwest, has been shut and reopened repeatedly by blockades, a barometer of every political crisis.
A boom the population cannot feel
The macro numbers look spectacular. Real GDP rebounded 12.4 percent in 2025 as production averaged about 1.3 million bpd, up from 1.09 million the year before.
Daily life tells another story. Power cuts, cash shortages at banks and crumbling services persist, and Global Finance magazine summed up the paradox: output at a 12-year high, revenues trickling to the people.
The pattern has history. Output collapsed during the 2020 blockade and wobbled again in 2024, when a fight over the central bank briefly choked exports.
The reason is political. Libya remains split between rival administrations in Tripoli and the east, and oil money is the prize each needs to fund patronage and power.
The NOC itself has said that pushing production toward higher plateaus will need billions of dollars in new investment. That is exactly what the returning majors are being courted to provide.
For the majors, the calculus is familiar frontier math. Reserves this large and this cheap to lift exist almost nowhere else outside the Gulf, and the discount for chaos is the price of entry.
Why it matters beyond Libya
Libya is OPEC’s wild card, since swings in its output move global balances. Its recovery lands just as OPEC+ raises quotas in a test for Africa’s petro-states, and more Libyan barrels press on the same prices Nigeria and Angola depend on.
The country is also a front in the wider contest for African resources that The Rio Times tracks in Africa: The New Scramble. Western majors returning to Tripoli is as much geopolitics as geology.
For Europe, the stakes are direct. Libya sits closer to Mediterranean refineries than any Gulf producer, and every stable barrel eases the continent’s supply math.
There is a Latin American echo here that Rio Times readers will recognise. Venezuela also sits on vast reserves while its people queue for basics, and resource wealth without functioning institutions is a promise the state cannot cash.
What to watch
The 1.5 million bpd target by year-end is the number to track. So is whether the licensing-round contracts turn into rigs on the ground, and both depend on the ceasefire between rival camps holding.
Diplomats have spent years trying to reunify the two governments without success. Oil money keeps both administrations alive, which is why neither has an incentive to lose control of it.
The harder question has no timeline: when, if ever, the barrels become hospitals, grids and salaries. Thirteen years of waiting suggest patience, not optimism.
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Frequently asked questions
How much oil is Libya producing now?
About 1.49 million barrels per day in total — roughly 1.44 million of crude plus condensates — the highest since 2013, according to the National Oil Corporation.
Which oil majors are returning to Libya?
BP, Shell and ExxonMobil have agreed to return, drawn by Africa’s largest crude reserves of about 48 billion barrels.
Why don’t ordinary Libyans benefit from the oil boom?
The state remains split between rival governments in Tripoli and the east. Despite 12.4 percent GDP growth in 2025, power cuts, cash shortages and weak services persist.
What is Libya’s oil production target?
NOC chairman Masoud Suleiman aims to reach 1.5 million barrels per day before the end of 2026.
Connected Coverage
Africa’s petro-politics run through our files: how OPEC+’s output hikes test the continent’s producers and how Libya courted the majors in a landmark licensing round. For the wider contest, read Africa: The New Scramble and follow the Northern Africa hub.
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