Recognition of community water management in the National Development Plan: a step forward for Chiapas. Isaí Flores for El Heraldo.
According to the civil association ‘Cántaro Azul’, the explicit inclusion of community water management in the National Development Plan (NDP) 2025-2030 is an important step towards recognition. The organisation documents that more than 50 per cent of the population of Chiapas, which has more than 5.5 million inhabitants, does not have access to water services.
In a statement, Cántaro Azul points out that the National Development Plan now includes the legal recognition of community water and sanitation systems, which is in line with sustainable development goals. The document sets out guidelines for the legislative work of the current six-year term, and Cántaro Azul hopes that it will be debated and approved by the Congress of the Union and sent to the country’s states for local implementation.
Specifically, the Sustainable Development Axis lists a series of strategies to achieve Goal 4.6, which aims to “guarantee the right to water for the entire population through efficient, sustainable and climate-resilient management, protecting the integrity of watersheds and ensuring its availability for present and future generations”.
Within this section, strategy 4.6.9 stands out, last on the list but no less important: Design mechanisms for the legal recognition and strengthening of community water and sanitation systems. In the case of Chiapas, it will be necessary to develop a comprehensive service plan that meets the needs of the population in all municipalities.
The National Development Plan is based on so-called ‘Mexican humanism’ and is supported by the 100 commitments announced at the beginning of the six-year term. So far, however, this plan is a letter of good intentions and an ambitious project in terms of proposals and the promotion of citizen participation. Nevertheless, its objectives and strategies must be recognised by the Congress of the Union and the local congresses in order to work on its implementation through the necessary legal and regulatory frameworks, says Cántaro Azul.
In this context, there is also an initiative to enact a General Water Law, which would, among other things, ensure the legal recognition of the work carried out by organisations, boards, committees and municipal water and sanitation systems. Although the National Development Plan shows progress on this issue, it is essential to maintain mobilisation and presence in the public debate in order to ensure public policies that put into practice the postulates and principles of a development model of well-being, social justice and sustainability.
The presence of community water management in the National Development Plan is the result, among other factors, of the mobilisation and collaboration of various community and civil society organisations, which for more than two years have been raising the demand for constitutional recognition of this activity, which has historically been carried out in conditions of insecurity and precariousness, the organisation affirmed.
The National Development Plan 2025-2030 has just reaffirmed the federal executive’s cross-cutting demand for access to water and sanitation throughout Mexico. It is to be hoped that the legislative work in the Congress of the Union and the State Congresses will succeed in incorporating these principles for their concrete application, both in the Political Constitution and in the urgent General Water Law. Community organisations, the academic world, civil society organisations and, in general, all those involved in the issue are invited to continue working on the issue and to monitor progress. The National Development Plan is articulated around 4 general axes and 3 cross-cutting axes that structure public policy as a whole.
