How Bad Is Mexico’s Water Crisis?

In April, Mexico’s National Water Commission (CONAGUA) published an alarming figure — 64.6% of the country was experiencing moderate to exceptional drought conditions. The intense drought has highlighted a question looming over Mexican academic circles for years: Are major Mexican cities headed toward a “Day Zero” where the water supply could run out?

Pinpointing an exact timeframe has proven difficult. While certain Mexico City neighborhoods have faced water problems for years, some experts raised concerns earlier this year that “Day Zero” could happen on a citywide level as soon as late June 2024. While recent rains helped ease that timeline, the question remains fresh in residents’ minds. 

The country’s recent drought added a new sense of urgency to a problem experts have warned about for years. Roberto Constantino Toto, Metropolitan Autonomous University (UAM)’s water research network coordinator, said in August 2023 that he believed “Day Zero” could be less than four years away. 

Constantino explained during a press conference that while the hypothetical dates posed by experts vary widely, the big picture is alarming: “If everything stays as it is, the estimate puts [Day Zero] in 2028, others place it in 2050,” Forbes Mexico reported. “But whatever the estimate is, it is very concerning,” he said. 

Hurricane Season: A Brief Respite

Tropical Storm Alberto caused serious damage and six deaths in the northeastern state of Nuevo León as it passed through the area in late June 2024. It also stabilized waning water levels in Southern and Central Mexico. And yet, the Cutzamala System, the country’s largest aqueduct and reservoir network feeding Greater Mexico City, remained only 26.26% full as of 25 June 2024 compared with historic levels of 58%.

One reason is that the three main reservoirs feeding the Cutzamala System are located between Central Mexico and the Pacific Coast — an area suffering from its worst dry spell in a decade. While Mexico City also relies on hundreds of wells apart from Cutzamala, those cannot fully satisfy its water demand.

“For many years we have depended on the Cutzamala System to give us water in Mexico City,” environmental engineering researcher Óscar Monroy told Mexico City radio station 88.9 Noticias. “But it is an error to spend so much on bringing in water while depriving the Cutzamala region of agricultural and economic development.” 

Drought and Distribution: Complementary Challenges

Alongside the atypically severe drought in 2024, Mexico has lacked adequate hydraulic infrastructure for decades. 

During years with normal rainfall, the largest cities discard a significant amount of surplus rainfall along with raw sewage because they lack parallel drainage systems. Furthermore, The Washington Post reported that almost 40% of Mexico City’s water is “lost in transit because of leaky pipes,” citing data from the city’s water operator (SACMEX). 

An even greater problem is the overall pollution of water resources. “Public policies are vague enough as to allow for 94% of industrial and poorly treated effluents to be discharged in natural water bodies, which will subsequently be used for agricultural irrigation,” biotechnologist Ana Karen Agustín Navarro pointed out in academic engineering magazine Revista Construye. 

Citing figures from the Mexican Institute for Competitiveness, Navarro shed light on the generally low availability of clean water per inhabitant in Mexico. She noted that this figure in Mexico is about 3,200 cubic meters on average per year, while countries such as the U.S. have 8,600 cubic meters.

Organized Crime: Complicating the Crisis

Mexico has also been facing an ongoing problem with organized crime groups exploiting water sources, which only adds to its issues with widespread drought. 

At the height of Mexico’s drought in May 2024, media outlets reported that the major cartel La Familia Michoacana committed arson in Guerrero’s tropical forests. Guerrero is one of the eight states containing the Balsas River basin, Western Mexico’s largest fluvial system that runs from the Pacific Coast and feeds into the Cutzamala System.

The criminal group burns the forest to clear the way for drug plantations, illegally sells the remaining lumber, and terrorizes local communities into submission. The National Forestry Commission (CONAFOR) estimates that up to one-third of Mexico’s forest fires could be set intentionally, further taxing limited water resources.

A second, less-studied issue deals with how drug cartels clandestinely exploit dams, natural reservoirs, and streams to sell water via tanker trucks in water-deprived urban and rural areas. While no national data exists about the scale of this activity, Mexico City authorities received 1,388 reports of clandestine water extraction points between January 2018 and mid-February 2024, business outlet Expansion reported. These are connected either to the city's underground wells or distribution system. In times of crisis, organized criminal groups tend to fill the gaps left by the government — and water will be no exception. 

Incoming President: New Water Proposals

Mexico’s President-elect Claudia Sheinbaum is not new to the water availability problem. With a background in academic research focused on urban sustainability, Sheinbaum has collaborated with the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the University of California, Berkeley.

Sheinbaum created an academic research group focused on analyzing water availability in Greater Mexico City while serving as Mexico City’s mayor in 2019, which included city and state governments as well as CONAGUA. While the group’s analysis has not yet prompted any specific government actions, it is expected to shape the Sheinbaum administration’s policies.

On 29 April 2024, Sheinbaum met with leaders of the National Agricultural Council, the organization rallying the country's grain, dairy, and livestock producer associations. She said she plans to review the federal water law to distribute the resource more efficiently. She also mentioned the need to review existing federal concessions for the use of natural water resources and revamp the country’s defunct water treatment plants in need of maintenance. However, specific details about any possible changes to the law remain to be seen. 

On 20 June 2024, incoming environment minister Alicia Bárcena stated that water resource management is one of the main challenges her office will tackle. Nonetheless, no specific information about these policies is expected until Sheinbaum and her cabinet take office on 1 October 2024.

“The comprehensive management of water throughout the country is a big dilemma,” Bárcena said during a press conference on 20 June 2024. “The country requires a great restoration crusade to combat deforestation, forest fires, destruction and pollution.”

But while it appears that extensive information exists about the depth of Mexico’s water problem and its causes, the government has taken little action to fix the issue in the near term.

Whether it’s Mexico or elsewhere in Latin America, Southern Pulse has the experience, network, and relationships to simplify this challenging region with honest, direct answers to your most complicated questions.

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