Mexico to create climate agency

Friday, 17 January 2014 00:10 
BY MAURILIO SOTO
The News


MEXICO CITY – President Enrique Peña Nieto announced the creation of a National Hurricanes and Severe Climate Agency on Thursday.

The announcement was made during the 25th anniversary celebrations for the National Water Commission (Conagua) at its headquarters on the south side of Mexico City.

Peña Nieto said that $170 million will be spent on the new dependency — $105 million of which will be financed by the World Bank — which will be used to construct 10 regional monitoring stations to provide meteorologists with more precise and opportune information.

Peña Nieto announced that Conagua’s 2014 budget would be 50 billion pesos ($4 billion).

He said this will be spent on strengthening drinking water infrastructure, increasing water security in droughts and floods and making drinking water services more accessible.

He added that Conagua would spend 13 billion pesos on 21 “high social-impact” water projects, such as lakes, canals, drinking water plants and infrastructure, drainage and residual water treatment plants.

These projects, he said, will take place in Baja California, Baja California Sur, Campeche, Chiapas, Chihuahua, Guanajuato, Guerrero, Michoacán, San Luis Potosí, Tabasco and Zacatecas.

He added that more projects will be carried out across other states in coming years.

Peña Nieto said that he will work with the Urban and Rural Development Secretariat to prevent citizens from building and living in areas highly susceptible to extreme weather.

He said that this would reduce the impact of these occurrences and allow Conagua to respond to emergencies more effectively.

Conagua Director General David Korenfeld Federman said that the foundations for a new water system in the country have started to be built during 2013.

He said that Mexico’s needs have changed during Conagua’s 25 years of operation, and that the country is moving beyond reactive strategies to policies and standards of prevention and damage control.

He added that the nation needs to learn how to live with the effects of climate change, which mean more intense floods and droughts.

Korenfeld Federmanwent on to say that Conagua’s new website provides real-time severe weather alerts to keep the 37 percent of the population with internet access informed.