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Opinion note
  • Agua Segura

10 Years of Agua Segura: Lessons Learned, Challenges, and the Future of Water

By Manuel Saurí, CEO of Agua Segura

It has been an intense 10 years, filled with significant entrepreneurial, corporate, and personal experiences. A tremendous decade, full of lessons learned, challenges, achievements, and also mistakes that taught us valuable lessons. One of the most beautiful aspects was choosing to found a venture focused on water—a path that forced us to always be present, to focus on the essential, and to work with science without abandoning the art or sensitivity of connecting with the human element.

Water is not just an element: it is territory, culture, health, and opportunity. Over these ten years, we’ve come to understand that caring for water means caring for life in all its forms. We learned that every watershed, every well, every community is a universe unto itself, with its own voices, histories, and challenges. And we understood that nothing can be transformed from a distance: you have to be in the territory, listen, learn, respect, and co-create solutions with the people who live there.

A Journey Rooted in Conviction and Science

At Agua Segura, science provided us with the method: measure, understand, demonstrate. Working for water security demands an understanding of water cycles, measuring quality, diagnosing soil and environmental conditions, and planning based on knowledge. Designing solutions to the water crisis requires data, but also empathy and humility.

Technology gave us speed and scale. Thanks to filtration tools, remote monitoring, humidity sensors, and ultrafiltration systems, we managed to reach more territories more efficiently. But we also learned that no innovation is useful if it is not adapted to the local reality. That is why every solution implemented was conceived with and for the community.

Education as a Bridge

Beyond technology, one of the great pillars of these years has been education. Community workshops, school activities, and awareness campaigns helped us build trust, strengthen local participation, and foster habits of hygiene and water care. The WASH (Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene) approach was a key guide.

Throughout the years, we also incorporated art as a tool for raising awareness. Through murals, songs, games, and storytelling, we managed to connect with people on an emotional level, generating ownership and a sense of belonging around water as a right and essential resource.

Water as a Challenge and a Driver for Transformation

Starting a venture in water is not easy. It means choosing to work with deeply rooted cultures and raw, urgent needs. It means navigating situations of great sadness, but also witnessing solutions that transform lives. It means committing to long, complex processes that require patience, collaboration, and deep conviction.

During this decade, we faced contexts of extreme water stress, territories with severe pollution, communities without access to water, and scenarios of climate crisis. In all these places, we confirmed that joint work with local allies is the foundation of any successful project. Collaboration between the public sector, private sector, foundations, and citizens is essential to sustain solutions over time.

10 Years of Collective Impact

Today, as we complete ten years, we celebrate not just projects or milestones achieved, but a collective learning: that water is a driver of development, that the territory holds immense value, and that collaboration is the only viable way to face the challenges. Over these years, we implemented projects for water and sanitation access, wetland restoration, watershed reforestation, water quality monitoring, irrigation efficiency improvements, and more.

We have worked with over 1,000 communities, benefited hundreds of thousands of people, trained local leaders, and brought together young people committed to sustainable development. In every experience, we reaffirmed that real change occurs when solutions arise from the territory, respecting local voices and leveraging their knowledge.

Looking Ahead: What’s Next

The road ahead is equally challenging, but also clearer. We want to continue measuring, innovating with purpose, and, above all, being present: in the territories, with the communities, with partners, and with the new generations.

We know that the water crisis is one of the greatest global threats. Scarcity, pollution, unequal access, the loss of natural sources, and the deterioration of aquatic ecosystems require urgent responses. That is why Agua Segura is committed to Nature-Based Solutions (NBS) for water, aquatic ecosystem restoration, and aquifer recharge projects as central pillars of our agenda.

Furthermore, we promote partnerships with companies to advance Corporate Water Stewardship. The private sector plays a key role in sustainable water management and can be an active part of the change. The same applies to the role of governments and the need for public policies that prioritize water security as a foundation for human development.

Conclusion: Ten Years for Life

These ten years confirm one thing: that water is history, present, and future. And working for it is, ultimately, working for life. Water conservation is everyone’s task. Every restored well, every restored watershed, every filter installed, every workshop conducted is a small but major contribution to a more just and sustainable world.

Thank you to all the people, communities, allies, donors, and teams that made this journey possible. We are aiming for much more: with science, with art, with data, and with heart. Because water deserves it. And because the future we dream of is built drop by drop, community by community, project by project.

For more information check https://aguasegura.com/blog/

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Opinion note

A Personal Bet and a Bet on Water-Agua Segura

By Catalina Deluchi, VP and Business Development Director at Agua Segura

For a large part of my professional life, I was linked to the corporate and marketing world. There, I learned the importance of strategy, innovation, efficiency, and brand value. However, as time passed, I began to feel that something was missing: I needed my work to also leave a positive mark on society and the planet.

This personal process led me to look closely at the great challenges of our time, and one of them moved me profoundly: the water crisis. Water is not just a natural resource: it is the foundation of life, health, food production, energy, and communities. Yet, we are facing an alarming scenario: by 2030, water demand could exceed availability by 40%. This projection jeopardizes global water security and requires urgent solutions.

In 2019, I began my journey with Agua Segura, a triple-impact company that designs and implements projects related to water access and sanitation in vulnerable communities. In 2022, I decided to take a further step: becoming a partner. This decision marked a before and after, not only professionally but also personally. Because investing in water is not philanthropy: it is a bet on the future. It is understanding that business competitiveness, economic stability, and community well-being largely depend on how we manage this vital resource.

The companies of the future must have sustainability incorporated into their DNA, and water will be a transversal focus. Without water, there is no health, development, or innovation possible. Water conservation and the promotion of sustainable water management strategies are an urgent necessity today, involving both the public and private sectors. In fact, many community water projects—including those linked to WASH (Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene)—demonstrate that generating positive impact is possible when working collaboratively.

For me, this decision is also deeply personal. It is choosing to align my values with my actions. It is trusting that from our respective places—whether as individuals, companies, or society—we can make a difference. It is also, like many women who now lead impact projects, betting on a more integrating, collaborative, and transformative vision.

One of the most powerful lessons from these years has been understanding that no project can have a real impact unless it is built from the territory, together with those who live there. At Agua Segura, we are clear about this: we work hand-in-hand with local allies, communities, and governments to identify opportunities, design adapted solutions, and ensure that the impact is lasting. This is the key to ensuring that projects are not merely interventions, but real transformations in water access and sanitation.

I also learned that challenges are not faced with prefabricated recipes, but with active listening, empathy, and co-creation. The response to water scarcity, source pollution, and lack of infrastructure requires multiple approaches: from the restoration of aquatic ecosystems and aquifer recharge, to the use of sustainable technologies and the strengthening of local capacities.

This path has not been easy. Venturing and leading in the water world involves overcoming structural barriers, cultural resistance, and, often, a lack of reliable data and information. But it also means being part of an increasingly strong network of individuals, companies, and organizations committed to change.

Today, I am proud to be part of Agua Segura and to contribute my experience to a mission I fully share: building local and sustainable solutions to one of the most pressing crises of our time. And I do so with the certainty that every effort, every alliance, and every project we implement is a seed that grows. A seed that carries not only water, but also health, dignity, equality, and opportunity.

The bet on water is, ultimately, a bet on life.

For more information check https://aguasegura.com/blog/

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Opinion note

World Environment Day: Why Plastic Is Also a Water Crisis

Every June 5th, the world pauses for a moment to remember something that should be self-evident: the planet we inhabit has limits. World Environment Day, led by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), is an opportunity to put the most urgent environmental challenges on the agenda and call for collective action.

This year, at Agua Segura, we want to highlight a connection that often goes unnoticed: the relationship between plastics and the water crisis. A relationship that is not metaphorical. It is chemical, ecosystemic, and deeply territorial.

Plastic doesn’t disappear. It breaks down and reaches the water

When plastic is not properly managed, it doesn’t disappear. It fragments into increasingly smaller particles — known as microplastics — that end up in rivers, watersheds, aquifers, and oceans. According to UNEP data, between 9 and 14 million tons of plastic enter the ocean every year. But the problem doesn’t start or end at sea.

Microplastics have been found in drinking water sources, agricultural soils, fish tissue, and human blood. They affect aquatic biodiversity, disrupt the natural cycles of ecosystems, and compromise the quality of water that entire communities depend on to live, produce, and develop.

The plastic crisis and the water crisis are not two separate problems. They are two symptoms of the same production and consumption model that ignores the natural limits of the planet.

Water security and biodiversity: an interdependent system

At Agua Segura, we work with this reality on the ground every day. We know that water security cannot be guaranteed by infrastructure alone. It depends on healthy ecosystems, functioning watersheds, soils that absorb water effectively, and communities with the capacity to care for and manage this resource.

When ecosystems become contaminated — with plastics, agrochemicals, or industrial waste — that chain breaks down. Wetlands lose their retention capacity. Degraded soils no longer filter as they once did. Communities that rely on surface or groundwater sources are left exposed.

That is why talking about the environment on June 5th is also talking about water. And talking about water means talking about the natural systems that sustain it: forests, wetlands, soils, rivers, aquifers. All of them threatened, among other things, by plastic pollution.

What can companies do?

Organizations have a role that cannot be delegated. Not only because plastic and water are part of their value chains, but because they have the capacity to scale solutions that go beyond their own operations.

This year, together with Unplastify, we developed a series of special proposals for corporate teams looking to engage with this agenda in a concrete, meaningful, and transformative way:

Inspirational talk: a awareness session on the impact of plastics on water, nature, and communities. Ideal for building internal awareness and opening conversations about sustainability within teams.

Solution design workshop: a participatory dynamic for co-creating concrete responses to plastic and water challenges. An activity that combines creativity, collaboration, and purpose.

Clean-up day: a collective action experience in contact with urban nature. Because change is also built with our hands.

These proposals are not just team-building activities. They are opportunities for organizations to integrate the environmental agenda from within, with teams that understand the problem, commit to the solution, and build a culture of sustainability.

June 5th is a date. The commitment is permanent

World Environment Day serves an important function: it raises visibility. But the environmental crisis has no expiration date and cannot be resolved with a single awareness event. It requires strategic decisions, sustained investment, and the willingness to change production and consumption models that have carried decades of inertia.

At Agua Segura, we believe that companies that understand this have a real competitive advantage: they build resilience before scarcity forces them to. They design solutions before regulators require them. They generate value for their territory before social conflict demands it.

Plastic in water is not just an environmental problem. It is an indicator of how an organization relates to the ecosystem it depends on. And changing that is possible, measurable, and necessary.

Does your company want to activate Environment Day with real impact?

Together with Unplastify, we design tailored proposals for teams that want to go beyond communication and connect with concrete environmental action. Talks, workshops, and clean-up days designed to build awareness, creativity, and commitment.

If you’re interested in exploring how we can support your organization this June 5th — and beyond — reach out to schedule a call. We’re here to help you design a water and environmental impact strategy that makes sense for your company and your territory.

Contact us at aguasegura.com and let’s talk.

#WorldEnvironmentDay #Plastics #WaterSecurity #WaterStewardship #Sustainability #ESG #AguaSegura #Environment #SDG6 #Biodiversity

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Opinion note

How to Improve Irrigation Efficiency in Collaboration with Farmers-Agua Segura

Esther Camacho Guerrero – Director of the Regenera Bajío Program, Nuup.

In Mexico, like many other countries, the agricultural sector is the main consumer of water. According to INEGI data, it accounts for over 67% of the total volume used nationwide. This figure highlights the urgency of implementing sustainable water management strategies, especially in a context of growing water crisis.

The country’s water security is closely linked to the agricultural sector’s ability to adapt and make more efficient use of the resource. Especially small-scale agriculture, which occupies about 72% of Mexico’s agricultural territory, still heavily relies on gravity irrigation systems, also known as furrow or flood irrigation. These systems have an estimated efficiency between 20% and 40%, leading to significant water loss, often groundwater, which could be better utilized.

Optimizing Irrigation is Possible: Experience from the Field

At Regenera Bajío, we work with producers to improve irrigation practices and move towards effective water conservation. We have proven in the field that, with adequate technical advice and commitment from the producer, efficiencies of up to 80% can be achieved. This translates into less water extraction, reduced costs, prevention of agricultural diseases, and, in many cases, improved productive yields.

But beyond tools and technologies, the key to change lies in the human factor. The experience, knowledge of the territory, and willingness of producers are fundamental to achieving a transition towards more sustainable agriculture.

A People-Centered Methodology

Aware of the particularities of the Mexican countryside, we developed an intervention approach centered on the producers. Our team provides personalized technical advice, with field visits that allow us to analyze the specific conditions of each plot: soil type, slope, crops, availability of irrigation infrastructure, and access to water.

Through interviews and direct observation, we analyze current practices:

  • How do they irrigate?
  • When and how often?
  • Why is that system chosen?

With this information and data measured on the ground, we propose practical and accessible adjustments, such as modifications to irrigation scheduling, valve installation, or small leveling works. These changes, adapted to the producer’s reality, usually have an immediate and significant impact on water use efficiency.

Changing Deep-Rooted Habits: A Cultural Challenge

One of the most relevant challenges is modifying habits that have been passed down from generation to generation. Many producers repeat irrigation routines because “that’s how it’s always been done,” even if they are not always the most suitable for the current climatic and environmental reality.

Therefore, our approach prioritizes close accompaniment, establishing relationships of trust from the beginning of the process. Listening to their doubts, responding with technical evidence, and respecting their timelines are key to generating lasting transformations.

We also promote the active participation of producers in recording field data. This exercise allows them to observe for themselves the results of the implemented improvements, which reinforces evidence-based decision-making and empowers communities to care for their resources.

Reusing Knowledge: A Virtuous Cycle

Another essential aspect of the methodology is returning the information generated in each agricultural cycle to the producers. This not only improves water management in their productive units but also strengthens the collective memory of the territory.

Furthermore, water efficiency becomes a gateway to other key issues, such as aquifer recharge, water quality, or even the relationship between agriculture and the restoration of aquatic ecosystems. Water that is not wasted in the field is water that can be kept in rivers, wetlands, or natural reservoirs.

Training, Community, and Local Solutions

Training is a transformative tool. Therefore, we organize group workshops in the communities where we work, addressing topics such as:

  • Current water challenges in Mexico.
  • Rights and obligations of producers.
  • Tools for measuring soil moisture.
  • Alternative irrigation systems and their maintenance.
  • Successful cases of transition to sustainable agriculture.

These spaces not only generate knowledge but also strengthen community ties and foster the exchange of solutions that arise from the territory.

Beyond Water: Towards Regenerative Agriculture

Improving irrigation efficiency is just the first step. At Regenera Bajío, we seek to generate a systemic impact, where water security is articulated with climate resilience, rural well-being, and the agroecological transformation of the Mexican Bajío

This implies moving towards productive systems that:

  • Contribute to aquifer recharge.
  • Prevent the contamination of water bodies.
  • Strengthen community water projects.
  • Integrate into watershed management.
  • Respect natural water cycles.

Conclusion: Alliances for the Future of Water

In the face of the water crisis, we need concrete, scalable, and just solutions. Irrigation efficiency is not just a technical goal: it is a key strategy to ensure water today and tomorrow. But to achieve it, technology is not enough. It requires knowledge, accompaniment, and, above all, trust in the transformative capacity of the producers.

At Regenera Bajío, we continue to bet on this path: one that unites knowledge, promotes collective learning, and cares for water as the common good it is.

Learn more at https://aguasegura.com/

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Opinion note

How to Measure Your Environmental Footprint to Make Better Decisions: The Value of Digitalizing Water, Energy, and Waste Consumption

How to Measure Your Environmental Footprint to Make Better Decisions: The Value of Digitalizing Water, Energy, and Waste Consumption

Sustainability is no longer just about commitments or declarations. Today, companies need reliable data to understand their environmental impact, identify opportunities for improvement, and make strategic decisions that generate measurable results.

In this context, measuring the environmental footprint has moved beyond a reporting exercise to become a management tool. Understanding how an organization consumes water, energy, and resources — and how it generates waste — makes it possible to turn information into concrete actions that reduce costs, lower risks, and strengthen competitiveness.

At Agua Segura, we believe that environmental management begins with knowledge. That is why we developed, together with Unplastify, the Environmental Footprint Tool: a platform that allows organizations to digitalize consumption data, simulate scenarios, and design personalized strategies to improve their environmental performance.

Environmental management starts with data

Many companies know how much they pay for water, electricity, or waste management, but few have an integrated view of how those consumption levels impact their costs, operations, and sustainability goals.

A lack of consolidated information often makes it difficult to answer fundamental questions such as:

  • Where are the greatest savings opportunities?
  • What impact would adopting new technologies have?
  • How would costs change in response to new regulations or tariff variations?
  • Which projects generate the highest environmental and economic return?

Answering these questions requires up-to-date information, comparable indicators, and tools that allow different scenarios to be analyzed before investing.

What is the Environmental Footprint Tool?

The Environmental Footprint Tool is a platform designed to help organizations measure, analyze, and optimize their environmental performance through data-driven management.

The tool integrates three core dimensions:

  • Water consumption
  • Energy consumption
  • Waste management

Based on this information, it enables organizations to build a continuous operational diagnosis and identify concrete improvement opportunities.

More than a dashboard of indicators, it functions as a decision-support system.

Digitalizing to manage better

One of the main challenges in sustainability is that many decisions are still made reactively.

Digitalizing consumption makes it possible to move from an approach based on estimates to continuous management, where information becomes a competitive advantage.

The Environmental Footprint Tool enables organizations to:

  • digitalize water, energy, and waste consumption data;
  • benchmark performance against references drawn from a proprietary database;
  • detect economic and operational savings opportunities;
  • access AI-powered recommendations to guide decision-making.

This information helps prioritize actions and accelerates the implementation of improvements with measurable impact.

Simulating scenarios before investing

One of the platform’s most valuable features is the ability to run simulations.

Before implementing a solution, organizations can analyze different scenarios by considering variables such as:

  • regulatory changes;
  • cost variations;
  • adoption of new technologies;
  • consumption reduction strategies.

The system also estimates the investment required and the direct and indirect savings associated with each alternative.

This reduces uncertainty and helps prioritize projects with the greatest environmental and financial impact.

From data to implementation

Measuring is only the first step.

The real value emerges when information is transformed into concrete projects.

That is why Agua Segura supports organizations throughout the entire process:

  • identifying opportunities;
  • designing solutions;
  • selecting and coordinating suppliers;
  • overseeing implementation;
  • measuring and reporting the impact achieved.

This comprehensive approach turns environmental strategy into verifiable results.

Water, energy, and waste: an integrated perspective

Traditionally, these resources have been managed separately.

However, there is growing evidence that they form part of the same system.

Reducing water consumption can lower energy use. Optimizing processes can simultaneously reduce waste and costs. Implementing efficient solutions can generate environmental and economic benefits at the same time.

An integrated perspective therefore makes it possible to identify opportunities that often go unnoticed when each indicator is analyzed in isolation.

Sustainability also drives efficiency

Companies today face new challenges:

  • increasing regulatory pressure;
  • more demanding ESG objectives;
  • growing expectations from investors and consumers;
  • the need to reduce operating costs;
  • risk management related to water and climate change.

Having tools that make it possible to measure, benchmark, and project scenarios helps organizations respond to these challenges with objective information.

Sustainability moves beyond being solely an environmental goal to become a tool for business efficiency and resilience.

Technology for better environmental management

Digital transformation is also reaching the management of natural resources.

Tools like the Environmental Footprint Tool allow organizations to evolve from reactive management to preventive management, grounded in indicators and evidence.

This supports organizations in:

  • improving environmental performance;
  • reducing costs;
  • optimizing investments;
  • strengthening their ESG strategy;
  • advancing toward more sustainable production and operating models.

From commitment to action

Sustainability begins when decisions can be measured.

Digitalizing consumption, understanding the impact of operations, and evaluating different scenarios makes it possible to move from diagnosis to action with greater speed and precision.

At Agua Segura, we believe the future of environmental management will depend increasingly on the ability to turn data into decisions — and decisions into positive impact.

The Environmental Footprint Tool was developed precisely with that goal in mind: to help organizations convert information into concrete solutions and move toward more efficient, resilient, and sustainable management.

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Opinion note

World Environment Day: Why Plastic Is Also a Water Crisis

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Opinion note

World Environment Day: Why Plastic Is Also a Water Crisis

Every June 5th, the world pauses to acknowledge something that should be self-evident: the planet we inhabit has limits. World Environment Day, led by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), is an opportunity to bring the most urgent environmental challenges onto the agenda and call for collective action.

This year, at Agua Segura, we want to address a connection that often goes unnoticed: the relationship between plastics and the water crisis. A relationship that is not metaphorical. It is chemical, ecosystemic and deeply territorial.

Plastic Does Not Disappear. It Fragments and Reaches Our Water

When plastic is not properly managed, it does not disappear. It breaks down into increasingly smaller particles — known as microplastics — which end up in rivers, watersheds, aquifers and oceans. According to UNEP data, between 9 and 14 million tons of plastic enter the ocean every year. But the problem does not begin or end at sea.

Microplastics have been found in drinking water sources, agricultural soils, fish tissue and human blood. They affect aquatic biodiversity, disrupt the natural cycles of ecosystems and compromise the water quality that entire communities depend on to live, produce and develop.

The plastic crisis and the water crisis are not two separate problems. They are two symptoms of the same model of production and consumption that ignores the natural limits of the planet.

Water Security and Biodiversity: An Interdependent System

At Agua Segura we work with this reality on the ground every day. We know that water security cannot be guaranteed by infrastructure alone. It depends on healthy ecosystems, functional watersheds, soils with strong infiltration capacity and communities with the ability to care for and manage the resource.

When ecosystems become contaminated — by plastics, agrochemicals or industrial waste — that chain breaks down. Wetlands lose their retention capacity. Degraded soils no longer filter as they once did. Communities that depend on surface or groundwater sources become vulnerable.

That is why talking about the environment on June 5th also means talking about water. And talking about water means talking about the natural systems that sustain it: forests, wetlands, soils, rivers and aquifers. All of them threatened, among other things, by plastic pollution.

What Can Companies Do?

Organizations have a role that cannot be delegated. Not only because plastic and water are part of their value chains, but because they have the capacity to scale solutions that reach far beyond their own operations.

This year, together with Unplastify, we developed a series of special proposals for corporate teams looking to engage with this agenda in a concrete, meaningful and transformative way:

Inspirational talk: a awareness session on the impact of plastics on water, nature and communities. Ideal for building internal awareness and opening sustainability conversations within teams.

Solutions design workshop: a participatory session to co-create concrete responses to plastic and water challenges. An activity that combines creativity, collaboration and purpose.

Clean-up day: a collective action experience in contact with urban nature. Because change is also built with your hands.

These proposals are not just team-building activities. They are opportunities for organizations to integrate the environmental agenda from within — with teams that understand the problem, commit to solutions and build a culture of sustainability.

June 5th Is a Date. The Commitment Is Permanent

World Environment Day serves an important purpose: it makes the crisis visible. But the environmental crisis has no expiration date and cannot be resolved with a single awareness event. It requires strategic decisions, sustained investment and the willingness to change production and consumption models that have decades of inertia behind them.

At Agua Segura we believe that companies that understand this have a real competitive advantage: they build resilience before scarcity forces them to. They design solutions before regulators require them. They generate value for their territory before social conflict demands it.

Plastic in water is not just an environmental problem. It is an indicator of how an organization relates to the ecosystem it depends on. And changing that is possible, measurable and necessary.

Does Your Company Want to Activate Environment Day With Real Impact?

Together with Unplastify we design tailored proposals for teams that want to go beyond communication and connect with concrete environmental action. Talks, workshops and clean-up days designed to generate awareness, creativity and commitment.

If you are interested in exploring how we can support your organization this June 5th — and beyond — reach out to coordinate a call. We are here to help you design a water and environmental impact strategy that makes sense for your company and your territory.

Contact us at aguasegura.com and let’s talk.

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