Libya’s oil production during the weekend reached 685,000 barrels of oil per day (bpd) up from around 600,000 a day last month, an official from the National Oil Corporation (NOC) revealed.

The country’s output increased following the lifting of the two-year blockade on key pipelines leading from the western fields of Sharara and El Feel.

The NOC official said output has been rising steadily from the Sharara field, which has a capacity of 330,000 bpd but did not provide any details concerning operations at El Feel, which has the capacity to produce 90,000 bpd.

General output is still lower than the over 1.6 million bpd that the North African country was producing before the 2011 uprising. The oil corporation has said it hopes to boost production to nearly 900,000 bpd by March, 2017, Reuters reports.

Anita Fatunji