For decades, Salvadorans have grappled with poor availability and quality of drinking water, yet the country has not enacted new water-resource legislation since 1970. That state of affairs could change, however, if the country’s National Legislative Assembly heeds a civic coalition’s call for legislation that for the first time would address water resources comprehensively. Such a bill was proposed on Jan. 6 by “Citizens’ Proposal for Water,” a coalition that includes environmentalists, Salvadoran Catholic Church leaders and academics with José Simeón Cañas Central American University (UCA El Salvador)—a leading center of higher education in the region. The proposal and several others presented in previous years were taken up for discussion earlier this year by the unicameral Assembly’s Environment and Climate Change Commission, but have languished there amid the Covid-19 crisis. The coalition is urging swift passage of a comprehensive bill that leaves no opening for future privatization... [Log in to read more]