page_title: Water supply and sanitation in Mexico
section_title: Service quality
hierarchical_section_title: Water supply and sanitation in Mexico / Service quality
caption_attribution_description: English: A rooftop water tinaco, to keep a consistent household water pressure when the municipal system cannot, and a satellite dish on a house's roof on Mexico City.
context_page_description: Water supply and sanitation in Mexico is characterized by achievements and challenges. Among the achievements is a significant increase in access to piped water supply in urban areas as well as in rural areas between 1990 and 2010. Additionally, a strong nationwide increase in access to improved sanitation was observed in the same period. Other achievements include the existence of a functioning national system to finance water and sanitation infrastructure with a National Water Commission as its apex institution; and the existence of a few well-performing utilities such as Aguas y Drenaje de Monterrey.
  The challenges include water scarcity in the northern and central parts of the country; inadequate water service quality; poor technical and commercial efficiency of most utilities; an insufficient share of wastewater receiving treatment; and still inadequate access in rural areas. In addition to on-going investments to expand access, the government has embarked on a large investment program to improve wastewater treatment.
context_section_description: Quality of service also leaves much to be desired. The 2000 census indicated that 55% of Mexican households with access to piped water received services on an intermittent basis, in particular in smaller municipalities and poor areas. About 36% of wastewater was being treated in 2006, a share that is more than twice as high as the average for Latin America. However, an unknown share of Mexican treatment plants do not comply with norms for effluent discharge.
  In many areas, local water pressure is insufficient and/or unreliable. Thus, many houses have a small water tank known as a tinaco on their roofs. Water that accumulates in a basement cistern, known as an ajibe, is pumped up to it to provide pressure through gravity to the rest of the house regardless of pressure in the local system. In some newer homes, however, key appliances have their own pressure systems,
caption: A tinaco atop a Mexico City home
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