Dr Younes Alila, UBC professor of forest hydrology

Dr. Alila spoke in April 2024 to the Future of Our Forests conference in Kelowna.

Dr. Alila graduated from the University of Ottawa with a Bachelor degree in civil engineering in 1985, a Master degree in water resources engineering in 1987, and a Doctorate in engineering hydrology in 1994.

Dr. Alila teaches and conducts research on climate and land use change effects on water resources. Dr. Alila’s work over the last 20 years on forests effects on floods challenged  century-old conventional hydrologic wisdom about how forests affect large floods. His work on this topic has been the subject of much peer reviewed discussion among academics in the field and generated press releases by the American Geophysical Union.

Dr. Alila served as an expert witness in three court cases: Randy Saugstad vs. Tolko Industries Ltd. (logging effects on hydrology, 2015); Waterway Houseboats Ltd vs British Columbia (flood hydrology unrelated to logging, 2018); and Ray Chipeniuk and Sonia Sawchuk vs BCTS & Triantha (logging effects on hydrology, 2022).

Professor Alila’s research confirms the negative impact clearcutting has on forested watersheds and the long-overdue need for forest-related legislation to catch up with science. Dr. Alila includes a dire warning to governments who ignore the call for improved forest management practices. He says they are risking taxpayers’ money, which will be needed to pay for costly lawsuits which he says will become inevitable as the improving science continues to make the case. “Time is running out on us,” Alila said.

He adds that the rest of the world—Europe and Asia in general, and China in particular—has long recognized how clearcutting in upstream watersheds exacerbates both the frequency and intensity of flooding. Here in western Canada and the US, that scientific understanding has not been applied. “Here, we’re logging like there’s no tomorrow,” he says.