Puerto Vallarta (PVDN) – The tourist zone made up of Puerto Vallarta and the Riviera Nayarit could face annual economic losses of up to $276 million dollars in the medium term due to the impacts that climate change will generate on its business assets, strategic infrastructure, and its ecosystems.
The foregoing is part of the conclusions of the study called “Analysis of the economic risk caused by climate change in three tourist destinations in Mexico-Report for the Riviera Nayarit-Jalisco, Mexico, 2020”, which was financed by the Federal Ministry of Environment and the Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety (BMU) of Germany.
The analysis, prepared by federal bodies such as the Ministry of Tourism, the Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources (Semarnat), and the National Institute of Ecology and Climate Change (INECC), set an innovative objective for the tourism sector of Puerto Vallarta and the Riviera Nayarit:
“For the first time, it offers the tourism sector an approach to the economic cost of the damage that climate change could cause, both to business assets and strategic infrastructure, as well as to natural assets and ecosystem services on which tourism depends”, according to the report.
The economic impact that climate change will generate on the tourism sector in Puerto Vallarta and the Riviera Nayarit in the coming years was estimated taking into account the multiple effects that climate change could cause in the region, and for which the information contained in instruments such as the State Program of Action against Climate Change (PEACC) of the Government of Jalisco.
The Analysis of the economic risk caused by climate change mentions in this regard, “in the coming decades, the Riviera Nayarit-Jalisco will face conditions of higher temperatures and different variability in its rainfall; in addition to changes in the frequency and intensity of hazards such as hurricanes, floods (by storm surge or rivers), droughts, landslides, heat waves, forest fires, sea level rise, coastal erosion, and wave refraction”.
After studying the effects that climate change would have on the “ecosystem services” that this tourist destination requires (Impacts on the provision of water, on the regulation of floods, and on scenic beauty), as well as on the assets business and strategic infrastructure due to phenomena such as floods, landslides, hurricane winds, and storm surges, it was concluded:
“The impacts of climate change in the Riviera Nayarit-Jalisco could cause annual losses between $194.08 and $227.18 million dollars in the short term (2030); and between $244.87 and $276 million dollars in the medium term (2060). This when considering a critical scenario in which mitigation and adaptation measures are not implemented”.
One of the most relevant effects that climate change could cause in Puerto Vallarta, both due to its economic and social consequences, is the probable reduction in the supply of drinking water for the inhabitants and visitors of the area and, in general, for the sustainability of their economic activities.
The main problem is that the main aquifer that currently feeds the tourist destination is already overexploited, and everything indicates that climate change will cause a decrease in its recharging capacity, which will end up making this fundamental public service more expensive for the tourism sector.
Currently, the drinking water consumed in the Riviera Nayarit-Jalisco tourist destination comes from Puerto Vallarta (51 percent), Valle de Banderas (30 percent), Punta de Mita (3 percent) and Zacualpan-Las Aquifers (16 percent). Of all the water consumed in a year, 83 percent is destined for urban public use and services (tourism activities are included here), and the rest is used for the agricultural sector (14.31 percent), the livestock sector (0.02 percent), domestic use (0.02 percent) and industrial consumption (0.84 percent).
Therefore, it is the Puerto Vallarta aquifer that is already being overexploited by the authorities, and the one that could further worsen its condition with the progressive intensification of climate change:
“According to data from Conagua, of the four aquifers that provide the vital liquid to the destination of Riviera Nayarit-Jalisco, the Puerto Vallarta aquifer is overexploited, that is, each year an amount of water greater than the recharge volume is extracted. It is worth mentioning that this represents 51.10 percent of the water granted in the destination”, the report indicates:
“Climate change could cause a reduction in precipitation and an increase in temperature. As a consequence of this situation, a change in the distribution of natural assets is expected and consequently a lower recharge of the aquifer”.
The climatic effects on the tourist destination “could affect between 0.15 percent and 0.17 percent the recharge of the Riviera Nayarit-Jalisco aquifers in the short term (2030), while in the medium term (2060), the decrease in the reduction of the recharge would be between 11.56 percent and 22.47 percent”.
Facing this “deficit in the supply of water”, while the demand for the liquid increases due to the urban and tourist growth that is projected, will probably generate the need to look for alternative sources of supply, all of which will result in an economic impact -already included in the total estimate-:
“In the short term (2030) an increase of 52 percent in the cost of providing water is expected, mainly due to the volume of water required. While in the medium term (2060) the cost could increase by up to 188 percent, reaching up to $74.42 million dollars, in case of providing water through a desalination plant.
In the coming decades, the Riviera Nayarit-Jalisco will face conditions of higher temperatures and different variability in its rainfall; in addition to changes in . . .
