Capacidad institucional de los organismos de agua de Saltillo y Hermosillo, México

This paper reports on an evaluation of the management and performance of water utilities in the municipalities of Saltillo, Coahuila, and Hermosillo, Sonora, during the 2001-2015 period. The institutional capacity approach was used to analyze the political, administrative, and human resources management factors of both organizations and to compare their management outcomes. Our analysis indicated that the Saltillo organism has higher institutional capacity and has obtained better results than the Hermosillo organism. This study contributes to a better understanding of the factors that lead to effective practices among urban drinking water management organizations. These factors were found to be increased management autonomy, increased measurement coverage, indexation of rates, and staff training. The approach used during the study allowed for the identification of opportunity areas in both organizations, and it can be applied to the assessment of other organizations in the sector.