The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (SRE) announced on October 24, 2026, that Mexico completed the first year of Cycle 37 of Rio Grande water deliveries to the United States, with a delivery of at least 350,000 acre-feet, equivalent to roughly 431.7 million cubic meters, according to the figure confirmed by US Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins and reported by Infobae.

The delivery was completed amid an extreme drought that reduces water availability in the Rio Grande basin. According to the SRE, federal agencies coordinated actions to meet the minimum annual volume set out in the joint strategies announced on February 3, 2026. The ministry stated that it did so without jeopardizing the human right to water, community consumption, or food production in the border region. For northern Mexico, where dams and irrigation districts share the basin with the delivery, the treaty calendar defines how much water remains available year after year.

The cycle is measured in years running from October 25 to October 24 of the following year, under the 1944 Water Treaty. Mexico must complete a balance of 1.75 million acre-feet over five-year cycles, with minimum annual deliveries distributed in blocks. These are the key elements of the announcement:

  • The first year of Cycle 37 reached the agreed annual minimum. - Rollins indicated that the target is met for the second consecutive year, something that, according to her message, had not happened since the first administration of President Donald Trump. - According to Washington, consistent and predictable future deliveries, the accumulated water debt, and supply for farmers and ranchers in South Texas remain pending. - The SRE maintained that both countries continue technical coordination for the management of shared water resources.

The second year of Cycle 37 is already underway, and the basin states will review their water balance again in 2027. The outcome of the next block of deliveries, and the status of the border reservoirs, are the next data points that will shape the binational conversation.

This article was written with the assistance of artificial intelligence based on verified sources and reviewed by a human editor before publication.