Mexico poised to breach 75-year water treaty with US

Mexico is at risk of breaching a 75-year old water treaty with the US if it does not come up with a new strategy to deliver 457,800 acre-feet (565 million cubic meters – Mm3) of water to its northern neighbor by October 24. 

That amount represents 350,000 acre-feet of water that the Latin American country is expected to deliver annually under the US-Mexico water treaty of 1944, in addition to making up for the delayed delivery of around 108,000 acre-feet that it has postponed during the 2015-20 cycle. 

Delays within the five-year cycles are not considered to be a debt, Mario López Perez, senior water resources consultant and former manager of binational water affairs at Mexican water authority Conagua, told BNamericas.  

“Debt is when the cycle is over and there is already a final account of how much was missing. As of today, there is no such deficit,” he said. 

Under the 1944 treaty, the US is committed to sending 1.5mn acre-feet of water from the Colorado River basin to Mexico in 12-month periods, which represents 10% of the river’s average flow, according to the US Congressional Research Service. 

Meanwhile, Mexico must send 1.75mn acre-feet in five-year cycles from the Río Grande’s six major tributaries that cross its territory. 

While Mexico has complied with its duties under the treaty in previous cycles, various environmental challenges have held back Mexico’s water deliveries, López said. 

There are also concerns that the country could fall behind in its five-year delivery this year, as recent conflicts in border municipalities over the management of water have reduced Conagua's choices. 

SOCIAL CONFLICT 

The administration of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) said it would comply with the international agreement, but so far Conagua has not disclosed any plan to avoid a shortfall in the deliveries this year.

At the beginning of the year, the authority said it would extract 1,000Mm3 of water from the La Boquilla reservoir in Chihuahua state, 150Mm3 of water from the Marte R. Gómez reservoir in Tamaulipas state and 100Mm3 from another water body in Coahuila state to settle its five-year cycle obligations to the US.  

However, that strategy infuriated Chihuahua farmers, who clashed with members of the national guard in February and attempted to force their way into the La Boquilla dam and take over the facility. 

Conagua withdrew its original strategy shortly after the incident and said it would come up with a new solution.

AMLO also said that the original proposal would guarantee water for the nearby municipalities and the payment of the obligations. 

Nevertheless, the conflict has raised concerns on the US side of the border. 

“South Texas irrigation districts are concerned about potentially running out of water this year if Mexico doesn't deliver the required volumes," Lori Kuczmanski, public affairs officer at the International Boundary and Water Commission (IBWC), told BNamericas. 

“Officials from the US government and the state of Texas are concerned and have continued to press Mexico to deliver sufficient volumes of water to avoid a debt,” she added.

Mexico has the right to two-thirds of the water flows that feed into the Río Grande from the six major tributaries in Mexico: the Conchos, San Diego, San Rodrigo, Escondido, Salado and Las Vacas rivers. 

The US population near the Río Bravo [Grande] are those paying the closest attention to the issue, Steve Mumme, a political science professor at Colorado State University, told BNamericas.

“They're very unhappy because they feel Mexico has, with some regularity, fallen short of the five-year cycle commitment,” he said. 

A FAIR DEAL?

Irasema Coronado, director at Arizona State University's School of Transborder Studies, said in an email that the treaty was negotiated over 70 years ago and it clearly favors the US. 

“Many things have changed: the population in northern Mexico has grown tremendously, climate change, droughts, hurricanes.  All of these things affect the water debt,” she said, adding that the cancellation of plans to build a brewery in Mexico's Baja California state over water tensions had affected relations between the two countries. 

Mario López, who supervised the water deliveries for more than a decade, agreed that the treaty was negotiated under different circumstances and during a time of war. 

While it has benefited Mexico, the original deal sought to allow Mexico to extend its cycles to 10-year periods. 

“Why were the [deliveries from both countries settled like that]? Because the Río Bravo basin is more irregular in terms of rainfall and runoff, and its catchment area is smaller than that of the Colorado River basin. The Colorado River basin begins on the limits with Canada, it's a huge basin," he said. 

Mumme, on the other hand, pointed out that Mexico has a lot of flexibility under the treaty.

“If Mexico is behind and it doesn't deliver the necessary amount of water, it can request a debt from the US to be carried over to the next five-year cycle… That’s really where the genesis of this debate between the US and Mexico begins, it gets to the whole question of how much flexibility Mexico actually has under the treaty,” he said.

“In any given year, Mexico can withhold water… Mexico has the right to say ‘we can’t deliver that amount this year, but we can deliver that amount within the next five years,” he said.

But that flexibility has resulted in major headaches for Mexico in the past, López added.

The water expert recalled that Mexico was unable to make its full deliveries in the 25th and 26th cycles, so Mexico asked the US to push the deficit back to the 27th cycle. 

“So, all debts from the 25th and 26th cycle had to be met in the 27th cycle, plus what was committed that year. As a consequence, farmers couldn't irrigate their fields because all the water was committed to the US,” he said. 

A NEW DEAL?

When asked about a possible renegotiation of the deal, López said that this would be a very difficult mission. 

"It seems to me the most inopportune moment," he said, adding that the current US president would likely not favor Mexico. 

"Mexico has been benefited by the treaty; we receive more water than we deliver," he said, adding that there are areas of northern Mexico that do not have the means to extract their own water.

Meanwhile, Kuczmanski from IBWC pointed out, "Without the water treaty, there would be no agreement for sharing water between the two countries. Without the treaty, each country would possibly hold water in its upstream reservoirs rather than share it with the other country."

Pictured: Río Bravo: Credit: Organization of American States