FG lowers entry barriers and also puts up 50 oil blocks for bidding

The Federal Government has announced a reduction in entry costs for the 2025 oil licensing round as part of efforts to improve transparency, boost crude oil output and attract fresh investment into Nigeria’s upstream sector.

The Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC) disclosed this during a pre-bid webinar for prospective investors, stating that signature bonuses for the round have been reduced to between $3 million and $7 million. This represents a sharp drop from the $10 million charged in 2024 and the nearly $200 million required in earlier years.

According to the commission, the adjustment is intended to lower barriers to entry and shift emphasis away from aggressive cash bids toward technical capability, credible work programmes, financial strength and speed to production.

A total of 50 oil and gas blocks are on offer in the delayed 2025 licensing round, comprising 15 onshore assets, 19 shallow-water blocks, 15 frontier basin blocks and one deepwater block. The government aims to raise oil production from the current 1.5 million barrels per day to 2.7 million barrels per day by 2027 through the exercise.

Speaking at the pre-bidding conference in Lagos, NUPRC Chief Executive Officer, Oritsemeyiwa Eyesan, assured investors that the new framework would provide a transparent, predictable and stable regulatory environment.

She said the licensing round would be fully digital, allowing investors to access data and submit bids through an online portal, while oversight would be provided by the Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI) and other government agencies to ensure accountability.

Eyesan described the licensing round as a strategic intervention to grow reserves, improve production and strengthen Nigeria’s energy security, stressing that only firms with strong technical and financial credentials would be considered.

“With the approval of President Bola Tinubu, signature bonuses for the 2025 licensing round are now set within a range of $3m to $7m to reduce entry barriers and place greater weight on what truly matters, technical competence, credible work programmes, financial capacity and the ability to deliver production quickly,” she said.

She added that the decision reflects global capital mobility and Nigeria’s need to remain competitive in attracting long-term upstream investors.

The NUPRC said the licensing round would follow a five-stage process covering registration and pre-qualification, data acquisition, technical bid submission, evaluation and a commercial bid conference, all in strict compliance with the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA) 2021.

In a technical presentation, the Director of Lease Administration, Exploration and Acreage Management at NUPRC, Amber Ndoma-Egba, explained that the round would span five sedimentary basins, the Chad Basin, Benue Trough, Anambra Basin, Bida Basin and the Niger Delta Basin.

He said technical evaluations would focus on subsurface understanding, exploration and development plans, sustainability, host community development and lifecycle management, adding that technically weak bidders would not advance.

Ndoma-Egba also disclosed that the commission had approved a minimum work performance security of one per cent to support investment, noting that bidders could increase this voluntarily to improve their technical scores.

The NUPRC announced that the 2025 licensing round, officially launched on December 1, 2025, is targeting about $10 billion in new upstream investments and signals a re-engineered oil and gas sector focused on long-term value creation.