Libya plans its first bidding round for oil exploration in more than 17 years, Masoud Suleman, acting chairman of the National Oil Corporation (NOC), announced in a televised address on Monday.

Libya is Africa’s second-largest oil producer and a member of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec).

Foreign investors have been wary of putting money into Libya, which has been in a state of chaos since the overthrow of Muammar Gaddafi in 2011. Disputes between armed rival factions over oil revenues have often led to oilfields shutdowns.

In August, Libya lost more than half of its oil production, about 700,000 barrels per day (bpd), and exports were halted at several ports as a standoff between rival political factions over the central bank threatened to end four years of relative peace.

The shutdowns lasted for over a month with production gradually resuming from early October.

That did not stop major oil companies Eni, OMV, BP, and Repsol from resuming exploration activities in Libya last year after halting them for a decade. Italy’s Eni had already signed in 2023 an $8 billion gas production deal with Libya’s state-oil NOC.

In January, Libya’s acting oil minister, Khalifa Abdulsadek, told Reuters the country needed between $3 billion and $4 billion to reach output of 1.6 million bpd.

The country’s current crude production has reached over 1.4 million bpd, about 200,000 bpd short of its pre-civil war high, according to NOC.

Libya is exempt from Opec+ agreements to limit output.