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U.S., Mexico Agree on Water Supply to Quake-hit Region

By Xinhua Yihang - crienglish.com

U.S. and Mexican officials signed an agreement on Monday to make additional water supply to a Mexican region struck by an earthquake in April, the U.S. embassy said in a statement.

The agreement signed by U.S Interior Secretary Ken Salazar and Mexican Environment Minister Juan Rafael Elvira Quesada allows the region around Mexicali, the capital city of northern Mexican state Baja California, to use 260,000 acre-feet (nearly 321 billion liters) more water from the Colorado River.

Four people died in Mexicali on April 4 in an earthquake measuring 7.2 degrees on the Richter scale. The quake caused mudslides and significant damage to crops.

"This agreement represents an extraordinary achievement from the humanitarian perspective, but also sets the ground for a comprehensive agreement with Mexico on the Colorado River's management," Salazar said.

The river begins in the U.S. state Colorado and then travels south through Arizona and Nevada before crossing into Mexico, where it forms the border between Mexican states Sonora and Baja California.

The river has shrunk dramatically on the Mexican side of the border as Nevada city Las Vegas and U.S. farming area Imperial Valley have used up its water resources.

The extra water assigned to Mexico under the agreement will last until 2013, but Mexico will have to reduce consumption beyond that year in order to compensate the consumed water volume over time.

The two nations have a broader water deal, signed in 1944, which allows Mexico to use 1.5 million acre-feet (1.85 trillion liters) of water from the river.

The two nations also agreed to work on a renegotiation of this agreement, because the water level of the river has declined 45 percent in the last 10 years, and Lake Mead, which is part of the river basin on the U.S. side, is now at only 39 percent of capacity, its lowest level since the 1930s.


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