Mexico-U.S. Water Treaty Faces Biggest Test in 80 YearsExBulletin

The Rio Grande is visible between the border towns of Del Rio, Texas, and Ciudad Acua, Mexico, in January 2023. Brandon Bell/Getty Images .

. Brandon Bell/Getty Images

Eighty years ago, the United States and Mexico reached an agreement to share the waters of the two major rivers that flow through both countries: the Rio Grande and the Colorado. This treaty was reached at a time when water was not as scarce as it is today.

Mexico's water powers Texas' half-billion-dollar citrus industry and dozens of cities near the border. On the Mexican side, border states like Baja California and Chihuahua rely heavily on water from the U.S. side of the Colorado River.

Today, these water-sharing systems are facing one of the greatest challenges in their history. Mexico is behind schedule in delivering 265 billion gallons of water to the United States.

Unpredictable weather patterns due to climate change, population growth, aging infrastructure and significant water wastage have left both countries short of water and raised tensions along the border.

Maria-Elena Giner is the U.S. commissioner of the International Boundary and Water Commission, the binational agency that oversees the 1944 water treaty and settles disputes.

Mexico is “at its lowest level” since the treaty went into effect, Giner said. The treaty operates in five-year cycles, and the current deadline for deliveries is not until October 2025.

But “the problem is that they are so far behind that it will be very difficult, if not statistically impossible, for them to catch up,” Giner said.

Victor Magaa Rueda, an environmental specialist at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, believes that neither country can survive without the other's water. He considers the 1944 treaty a first step.

“We probably now need to think about how we manage water and how each part adapts to the changes we are experiencing in terms of climate,” Rueda said.

Farmers harvest cotton in a 140-acre field in Ellis County, near Waxahachie, Texas, in 2022. Andy Jacobsohn/AFP via Getty Images .

Andy Jacobsohn/AFP via Getty Images Tensions are rising in the United States

Texas’ last sugar mill has already closed this year due to lack of water, state lawmakers said. Now officials don’t want the same thing to happen to the state’s citrus industry, concentrated in the lower Rio Grande Valley, and other agricultural operations that rely on Mexican water.

Ten lawmakers from a bipartisan congressional delegation have urged the U.S. Congress to withhold money and aid to Mexico, other than funds for border control, until it provides needed water.

“South Texas farmers and ranchers continue to suffer financial hardship and could suffer the same fate as the sugar industry if Mexico continues to deprive the state of water,” the lawmakers wrote in May. “Furthermore, the lack of reliable water delivery is impacting municipalities and threatening the quality of life of many U.S. citizens living along our border.”

Texas Democratic Rep. Henry Cuellar signed the letter. He said this is not the first time he has noticed Mexico falling behind on water deliveries.

But the unpredictability of this cycle has created considerable challenges for members of his constituency, located in the far southwest corner of Texas along the Rio Grande.

“Mexico hasn’t even responded to this letter, which means something to me,” Cuellar said last month of the letter. “It means that the potential loss of money is probably less important to their communities than the water right now. Their silence shows that they are more interested in water than they are in money right now.”

Rep. Monica de la Cruz, a Texas Republican and another Texas representative who signed the letter, spoke before Congress in May to highlight the loss of agriculture and industry in South Texas.

“If we can't save our farmers, then Mexico doesn't deserve any money,” the Republican said. “We want our water, we demand it.”

Texas Republican Rep. Monica De La Cruz speaks to reporters during a news conference at the U.S. Capitol in 2023. Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images .

. Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images

True, Congress has not yet funded the government for the next fiscal year, which begins in October, and could take up a stopgap bill to avoid a shutdown, so the threat of financial losses for Mexico remains more theoretical at this point.

As urgent as Mexico's water supply may seem, it is not Texas' only problem. In Texas and several other U.S. states, a significant amount of water is being wasted due to infrastructure failures and leaks.

The state lost about 129 billion gallons of water in 2022, according to the latest figures available from water loss audit data submitted by public water suppliers to the Texas Water Development Board.

Water policy in Mexico

To address Texas' water shortage, officials last year proposed a solution: an “amendment” to the treaty that would allow Mexico to pay for water directly to South Texas instead of giving two-thirds first to the Mexican state of Tamaulipas, as the treaty currently specifies.

But quenching South Texas' thirst before its own citizens was probably not an option before this year's Mexican presidential election.

Negotiations on treaty changes have been completed and the two countries were scheduled to sign last December, but Mexico has not yet received formal authorization to do so, said Giner of the International Boundary and Water Commission.

Several Mexican officials contacted for this article declined to comment on the record about Mexican water deliveries to Texas and future treaty negotiations.

But on the Mexican side of the border, the country faces its own water problems beyond its conflicts with the United States. This year, a crisis in Mexico City left many residents without access to its drinking water system as the city braced for a possible shortage.

These tensions, combined with rapid population growth, have caused a serious delay in water delivery in the United States.

In April, Mexico's current president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, said the country would focus on ensuring water for its residents.

“We need to give priority to domestic water, which is consumed by people rather than businesses,” he said. “We are looking for a way to solve the problem of drought, water shortages, work is underway.”

Newly elected President Claudia Sheinbaum is expected to take a similar approach when she takes office in October, said Rueda, the environmental scientist.

An employee of Mexico's National Water Commission fills a tanker truck with drinking water that will be distributed in Mexico City in January 2024 after the city experienced water shortages. Rodrigo Oropeza/AFP via Getty Images .

Rodrigo Oropeza/AFP via Getty Images Problems before the last elections

This five-year cycle is not the first time Mexico has fallen behind in providing water to the United States.

By the end of the last cycle, which ended just days before the 2020 U.S. presidential election, Mexico had delivered most, but not all, of its water to the United States.

Mexico tried to withdraw water from a dam in the state of Chihuahua, but without success. Three days before the official deadline, Mexico and the United States agreed on a protocol allowing Mexico to transfer water from the Amistad and Falcon reservoirs, located along the border, to the United States to avoid a shortage.

But this transfer of water from the reservoir has nearly depleted all of the stored water resources in northern Mexico, making the country even more vulnerable to future disruptions.

For the current cycle, if Mexico is unable to supply all of its water, the treaty provides for the deferral of a water debt over one cycle.

So, if Mexico fails to catch up at the end of this cycle, it will be able to repay its debt at the end of the next cycle. Article 234 stipulates that neither country can be in arrears for two consecutive five-year cycles.

Rueda, an environmental scientist in Mexico, said some Mexican farmers want the treaty with the United States dissolved because they need water for their crops.

But such a decision would be disastrous for all the inhabitants of both countries.

“If we stop the treaty, it will mean a real disaster for this region, simply because of the selfishness of a few,” he said.

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