Severe drought puts stop to beer production in northern Mexico

President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has said that beer production in northern parts of Mexico is “over” as the region faces severe water shortages.

In a press conference on Monday, he said: “This is not to say we won’t produce any more beer, it’s to say that we won’t produce beer in the north. That’s over.”

The decision comes as northern Mexico faces a historic water shortage leaving major cities like Monterrey rationing water to its inhabitants as reservoirs hit the bottom of their basins.

The New York Times reports that some neighbourhoods in Monterrey have lacked running water for 75 days.

The decision poses enormous financial ramifications, Mexico is the world’s largest exporter of beer with over $5billion of beer leaving the country in 2021.

The AB InBev-owned Grupo Modelo, which produces Modelo, Corona, and Pacifico beers has breweries in the north of the country, as does the Heineken-owned Cuauhtémoc Moctezuma brewery that produces Dos Equis and Tecate.