ABSTRACT
Lima’s water supply system is one of the most complex and challenging in Latin America, and has been since the early sixteenth century, when the city was founded by the Spanish on the arid Peruvian coast in an area of small rivers and low rainfall. In the twentieth century, the chaotic expansion of the city caused largely by internal migration from rural areas exacerbated Lima’s water shortages. In recent decades, the provision of water services in Lima has also been compromised by lack of investment, inadequate maintenance, operational failures, and shifting political commitments resulting in infrastructure ‘bottlenecks’.
