Itzapalapa’s water trucks

Anna writes*

Water supply in Mexico City is a good indicator of the persisting inequality, as residents have to live with very different amounts of waters in this city of water scarcity. In Itzapalapa, the most populous and poorest district in the city’s east, people face severe water shortages. Therefore, their daily water supply is often brought by water tanks – or not. Whereas pipe pressure in rich districts like Cuajimalpa is about 14kg per cm² – enough to irrigate numerous golf courses – in Itzapalapa peoples’ pipes have a pressure of only 0,50kg per cm², which leads to dry taps and thus water scarcity. Due to the numerous leaks in the pipe system around 40% of the water that runs through the pipes is lost, which makes it extremely inefficient, but the funds that would be needed to renew the underground pipe system are immense. Thus, people in Itzapalapa must proportionally invest a lot of money and time to find and get water of acceptable quality. Alejandra Salgada, resident of Itzapalapa, estimates that about one fifth of their family’s income is spent on water, which makes them consider leaving the city because they can’t afford their life there.

Sometimes parents like Silvestre Fernandez have to choose between buying new diapers for their toddlers or buying water, which illustrates the severity of the situation in Itzapalapa. The district relies on the supply of water from 1000 tanks. The alternative to the tanks is getting water downhill from a municipal tap, that then needs to be transported on donkeys all the way uphill. Not only the residents suffer from the water scarcity, but the drivers of the tanks called pipas feel the negative consequences when they are threatened by desperate residents with guns and dry taps. This hopelessness for water also leads to water theft in form of illegal tank fillings. Apart from that, even if water reaches Itzapalapa it is often untreated and of low quality, which leads to health issues.

In order to relieve the miserable situation of water supply in Itzapalapa Clara Brugada, the mayor of this district plans to make use of the nearby located Xico lake to supply Itzapalapa with water. She wants the 600,000 residents of Itzapalapa who partially receive water only every week or two to have regular access through piped distribution. Apart from this possible solution, several pilot projects are under development to deal with the water crisis in Mexico-city. One of them is the rainfall catchment project, already realized in 25 schools in Santa Catarina, a part of Itzapalapa, which has been implemented by the Metropolitan Autonomous University of Iztapalapa. It allows the schools to be independent of water supply, as long as there is precipitation, whereas half of the water can be used in the school and the other half is used to replenish the degraded aquifer under Mexico-City. Unfortunately, those smaller scale sustainable possible solutions are often opposed by SACMEX, Mexico city’s water operator, which prefers larger-scale and more expensive solutions.

Bottom Line: There’s a need for new solutions and new policies if the water scarcity of Itzapalapa (and Mexico City) is going to be addressed.


* Please help my Water Scarcity students by commenting on unclear analysis, alternative perspectives, better data sources, or maybe just saying something nice 🙂

Author: David Zetland

I'm a political-economist from California who now lives in Amsterdam.

One thought on “Itzapalapa’s water trucks”

  1. Liebe Anna, its great that you talk about the dichotomy about large-scale and small-scale solutions. I do think that water management should be taken on a community basis, including small-scale solution like rain water harvesting etc. However, these initiatives rather support than change the way that water scarcity of a city is addressed. I think that it needs large-scale community orientated measures which are sustainable. Therefore, water utilities should not invest into desalination plants, but the restoration of water bodies, regulators should not make water free but readjust the pricing so that it is sensitive to the cities water scarcity. This also includes to generally give more responsibility to communities allow them to manage their water bodies. I believe that water management then succeeds to think in the long-term as it decentralises itself throughout the entire city and becomes more inclusive towards its consumers.

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