Water scarcity zone in Elqui extended for third consecutive year

The Ministry of Public Works extended for a period of one year, as of July 13, 2026, the declaration of water scarcity zone for the province of Elqui, in the Coquimbo Region. The decision was formalized in Decree No. 179, dated July 10, 2026, published in the Official Gazette of the Republic of Chile on Thursday, August 13, 2026, under reference CVE 2851683.

This is the third consecutive year that the province remains under this extraordinary regime: the original declaration was issued through MOP Decree No. 89, dated July 11, 2024, was extended by MOP Decree No. 75, dated July 11, 2025, and is now extended again, in line with what is permitted by Article 314 of the Water Code and the authority conferred by DFL No. 850, of 1997, of the MOP.

A third year of severe drought

The extension responds to the request of the Regional Presidential Delegate of Coquimbo (letter No. 305, dated May 25, 2026) and the formal petition of the Director General of Water (Acting) (Ord. DGA letter No. 380, dated July 9, 2026), once it was verified that the severe drought condition persists. Technical Report No. 09 of the Hydrology Division of the General Water Directorate (DGA), dated July 9, 2026, confirmed compliance with the criteria of DGA (exempt) Resolution No. 2,673, dated July 30, 2025:

• ICE (streamflow) and IEE (reservoir) indices equal to or less than -1.04 in surface waters.
• Extraction capacity of intakes for sanitary companies and Rural Sanitation Services below 50%, affecting 10% or more of the served population, as reported by the Superintendency of Sanitary Services (SISS) and the Hydraulic Works Directorate (DOH).

Measures to guarantee human consumption

During the validity of the extension, the DGA may require Vigilance Boards and administrators of state water resource development works to reach a redistribution agreement within 15 business days, prioritizing human consumption, sanitation, and subsistence domestic use. Among the extraordinary powers are:

• Ordering compliance with agreements within 5 business days from their approval, with effect opposable to all users of the basin.
• Authorizing extractions of surface or groundwater without the need to constitute water use rights and without being subject to the minimum ecological flow.
• Redistributing waters ex officio when no user organizations have been constituted.

The authorizations granted under Decree No. 75 shall remain in force, and the measure shall not apply to waters accumulated in private reservoirs. The map of the area, the technical report, and the background information will be made available on the DGA website once the decree has been officially approved.

The approval of the Comptroller General’s Office

The decree was signed by order of the President of the Republic by the Minister of Public Works, Louis de Grange Concha, and transcribed by the Undersecretary of Public Works, Nicolás Balmaceda Jimeno. The Office of the Comptroller General of the Republic processed the regulation with qualifications through official letter OF146487/2026, dated August 4, 2026, signed by the Deputy Comptroller General, Víctor Hugo Merino Rojas, which clarified that the extension is understood to refer to the declaration issued in 2024 and extended in 2025, and requested that the hydro-meteorological conditions considered be reassessed.

The extension keeps active, for the third year, a regime that empowers the State to intervene in the distribution of water in the Elqui River basin, protecting human supply over other uses in a province where agriculture and rural sanitation services depend on an increasingly scarce resource. The decision confirms that the water emergency in the central-northern zone of Chile has become a structural, not seasonal, problem.

Source: Official Gazette of the Republic of Chile, No. 44.524, August 13, 2026, General Norms, pp. 1-4 (official reference: CVE 2851683).