Drops of Change: Climate Change and Diverse Water Management Challenges in the Southern and Northern Basins of Mexico

This post is part of a monthly series called “Drops of Change” by the North American Youth Parliament for Water (NAYPW), a chapter of the World Youth Parliament for Water (WYPW). For more information on the NAYPW, you can explore their website or contact NAYPW at outreachnaypw@gmail.com.

Written by: (1) Cuauhtémoc Osorno Córdova, President of the Mexican Youth Parliament for Water and member of Red Mexicana de Cuencas, WATERLAT-GOBACIT network, and WYPW. Degree in Environmental Management from Universidad Juárez Autónoma de Tabasco (UJAT); and (2) Jessica Daniela Ocaña Falcón, management team of the Mexican Youth Parliament for Water and member of WYPW. Degree in Environmental Management from Universidad Juárez Autónoma de Tabasco (UJAT). 

Mexico is a country with low water availability. More than half of its territory is arid and semi-arid,  and water stress is increasing due to economic and population growth. This article highlights the conditions faced by two states of Mexico: Chihuahua in the north of the country, and Tabasco in the south. Both are located in transboundary hydrological regions and, similar to other countries around the world, they experience wide-ranging problems and impacts as a result of global climate change. 

Tabasco

The state of Tabasco has tropical characteristics, with a warm humid climate and abundant rainfall throughout the year. Tabasco shares water with Guatemala, including the Usumacinta river, which is an incredibly important water resource for Mesoamerica.

Tabasco state, México. Source: Wikimedia Commons, a free content repository hosted by the Wikimedia Foundation

Tabasco is  a naturally flood-prone territory, but the actions of the governments have been insufficient to avoid serious damage to the population in the face of meteorological risks and the impacts of the upstream waters that are discharged from the neighboring dams, like the water coming from the Peñitas dam, in the state of Chiapas. Those most affected areas are rural communities, which have indigenous populations and experience a greater degree of marginalization and poverty than the rest of the state.

The environmental authorities of Mexico have also reported an increase in the frequency of cyclones in recent years, with impacts on the coasts of Tabasco, which has caused severe disasters due to floods and landslides. In 2007, 62% of the state territory was covered by water and 75% of its population was affected by flooding.

Flood in Tabasco in 2007. Source: Government of México

In 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, Tabasco again suffered another strong flood, but this time, the decision was made to safeguard the state capital, Villahermosa, and the water was channeled instead towards rural and indigenous populations. These groups suffered serious damage, including loss of their households and damage to their economic activities.

Flood in Tabasco in 2020. Source: EFE/Jaime Ávalos.

For Tabasco, climate change models project increases in extreme rains and show high vulnerability to new floods, due to the potential increase in sea level on the coasts of Mexico.

Chihuahua

In contrast to the tropics of Tabasco, Chihuahua is dominated by an arid environment, with low rainfall during the year. While Tabasco shares international waters with Guatemala, Chihuahua shares the Bravo River with the United States.

Chihuahua state, Mexico. Source: Wikimedia Commons, a free content repository hosted by the Wikimedia Foundation

One of the biggest challenges that Chihuahua faces is guaranteeing water security, since storage volumes in its dams have continuously decreased over the last decade. The decrease in stored water in dams could pose high risks for certain sectors, especially agriculture and livestock.

Recently, between the months of July and September of 2020, there were clashes in the area between farmers and the National Guard, due to a lack of government coordination and communication to the population. The water from the dams in Chihuahua is earmarked to be used to deliver the volumes that Mexico has to transfer to the United States to comply with the International Waters Treaty of 1948. "La Boquilla", where the greatest conflict occurred, is the dam with the highest capacity in Chihuahua, but at that time, availability was very limited and the population felt that their water was being taken away in a militarized way.

Additional factors exacerbate the water challenges in the state of Chihuahua. For example, the state has been severely affected by droughts since 2011, and currently 47.5% of its aquifers are overexploited. In the future, some climate change scenarios for the 2015-2030 period project a decrease in rainfall of 15% and an increase in temperature of up to 1.4 degrees Celsius in the state of Chihuahua. The change in land use has caused negative impacts since the 1970s in the basin, through the deforestation of forests, the loss of riparian ecosystems and the increase in the agricultural area, which alarmingly deteriorated the availability of water in the area. This, combined with the overexploitation of the region’s aquifers, has contributed to a desertification of the territory, which makes the population even more vulnerable to climate change.

(Clashes at the La Boquilla dam in Chihuahua. Source: La Noticia Digital

Drought in Chihuahua in 2011. Source: La crónica de Chihuahua.

Conclusions

Mexico is a diverse country, and when it comes to water, like many other countries, it experiences concurrent problems of floods and droughts. Both situations can be aggravated by climate change. Therefore, it is essential to develop adaptation, mitigation and resilience policies in conjunction with the business sector and citizens that promote water security.  Chihuahua and Tabasco have laws and state plans for climate change, which is a good first step. However, the greatest challenge is to achieve the interest and political will of the government to apply sufficient economic resources to implement the projects in the basins.

Climate change is a factor that affects the guarantee of human rights and the fulfillment of the Sustainable Development Goals. In relation to water, climate change can promote and increase water conflicts, and climate migration. But on the other hand, it is an opportunity to promote new hydro-diplomacy in international relationships, ecological restoration, and the recovery of indigenous knowledge for the management of local ecosystems. Mexico also requires greater social awareness about climate change, as well as promoting renewable energies instead of traditional fossil fuels.

Finally, youth participation can be very important to achieve the goals of governments (such as the Paris Agreement or the Escazú Agreement), as well as to apply local actions, such as training and awareness workshops in vulnerable areas. It is advisable to generate specific programs of training and youth leadership on water and climate change. In the Mexican Youth Parliament for Water (Parlamento Mexicano Juvenil por al Agua), we have the mission to promote youth participation in decision-making spaces on water in the basins. We are currently designing a program of training workshops for young people living in areas of water vulnerability to generate technical, legal and institutional knowledge, in order to achieve actions with benefits for their communities. The challenges in Mexico and in the world are complex, and young people are working to provide fresh ideas and solutions to promote water sustainability. Together, let's flow towards a better future.