Lack of infrastructure haunts Uruguay water consumers

The ramifications of years of underinvestment in water infrastructure are hitting Uruguay’s agriculture sector hard, as the country grapples with severe drought.

“Irrigation isn’t a generalized practice in Uruguayan agriculture, even though local investigations have confirmed its positive effects,” Lucía Puppo, an academic at Universidad de la República, told BNamericas.

Only 15% of cultivated land is irrigated and only 4% if rice is excluded. “The drought effects wouldn’t have been so drastic if agricultural operations had included the necessary water reservoirs,” Puppo said. 

She added that producing more water is difficult because most superficial sources are claimed and deep wells won’t suffice. 

“There are periods in the year in which precipitations exceed crop demand and soil storage capacity. But currently Uruguay catches less than 4% of drainage water and the remaining 96% ends up in the Atlantic Ocean,” Puppo said, adding that Uruguay has the soil conditions to advert these losses, however. 

Aside from reservoir construction, rational water management is needed to ensure water quality and replenishment. 

Puppo said the agriculture ministry is helping producers by lowering energy bills and extending tax deadlines. The ministry is also structuring a well digging contract together with the environment ministry, the national planning and budget office, public lender Banco República and departmental governments. 

“It would be important that the project covers, beside wells, the construction of cutwaters by incentivizing the respect of the construction and management guidelines for such works, as well as the construction of larger irrigation reservoirs,” Puppo said. 

She highlighted that a 2017 irrigation law reform could help, as it provides a regulatory framework for multipurpose reservoirs and could allow non-sector actors to invest. 

The drought has also decimated Montevideo's potable water reservoirs, with the main drinkable water source for the metropolitan area, where half of the overall population lives, expected to be depleted soon, although Puppo said supply remains stable elsewhere.