Prof Chandra Madaramootoo, President Honorary, ICID

Aly Shady's work in CIDA and his frequent contact with colleagues around the world led him to go way beyond his civil service career. He was intrigued that professional societies had an innate ability to unite professionals, outside of their paid employment, to serve the greater good and make a broader impact on society, in order to improve human kind.

Aly Shady was perhaps the most passionate, persuasive, and personable water dignitary to have traversed so many pathways. He was an articulate and brilliant speaker, who used the most powerful arguments to convey his messages about water, irrigation, agriculture, food security, and poverty alleviation. A more passionate spokesperson on these topics is rare. Aly Shady was a person of logic, reason, principle, and above all of utmost professionalism. He was never swayed by the flavour of the day, by short sightedness, or by individual gain. He took the longer, broader view that it is the poor, the disenfranchised, the disadvantaged, the hungry, the water scarce, and the malnourished that we must serve. He frequently emphasized that it is these individuals who will ultimately judge the appropriateness of our actions.

The world is today poorer without Aly Shady. His sudden demise is way too early. He was a visionary extraordinaire, with boundless energy and enthusiasm. No mountain was too high to climb, no challenge was too difficult to overcome. He had an amazing propensity for conveying the heaviest of workloads. Yet, he remained a most charming, warm and hospitable person.

A full tribute from Prof. Madramootoo…. 

Prof Gao Zhany President, ICID

President Honorary Mr. Aly Shady was a great leader of international water community. He has not only provided excellent service and leadership to ICID, but also provided services and leadership to other international organization, such as World Water Council (WWC), International Water Resources Association (IWRA), etc. President Honorary Mr. Aly Shady made great contribution by building and promoting close links, cooperationamong international organizations. For most of us, the last time of meeting President Honorary Mr. Aly Shady was during the 21st Congress in Tehran in October 2011 when his health was not good but he still did his best to join us by taking a long flight.

President Honorary Mr. Aly Shady was a kind friend for many of us. He was a kind person with sense ofhumor and willingness to help others and share his knowledge with others. He was a great teacher for many professionals younger than him. We have lost a great leader, friend and teacher. His spirit will live with us and will encourage us to cooperate closely to share knowledge and make great contribution to solve water, food security and poverty problems. His demise is a heavy loss of ICID family. We are going to miss himbut I believe his spirit will live in us forever. May his soul rest in peace.

Laurie Tollefson, VP, ICID

Aly Shady was a great man who I greatly admired. He gave so much and asked little in return. He will be greatly missed by many.

Prof. Ragab Ragab, Vice President, ICID

Dr. Aly Shady was a distinguished water scientist with global views and vision. His vision contributed to the establishment of the World water council, the Arab water Council and the Arab water academy. He has been one of the ICID pillars who supported ICID with tireless efforts, dedication and enthusiasm.His sense of humour, his kind and likeable personality and his willingness to help and share his knowledge with seniors and juniors will greatly be missed. His dedication to water science and ICID earned him the respect, admiration and trust of the water community. Hewas ahead of his time in thinking and taking action - his approach to tackle water issues. Leading by example, he was unique; one in millions. The water scientific community, and the world at large, sadly lost one of the finest scientists Egypt and Canada ever produced. He will always be remembered for promoting global water issues as well as the food security issues. His caring and sharing, his willingness to help and educate, his eagerness to learn and listen to others and debate opposite views for the benefit of science are few of many attributes of Dr. Aly Shady. 

May God bless his soul and let him rest in peace in heaven.My profound condolence to his daughters at this time of grief and sorrow.

Prof. Dukhovny, Vice President Honorary, ICID

World Water community got big and sad loss - outstanding provider of water unity and advanced approaches to water management and water use Dr. Aly Shady has passed away. His work flourished on any position that he took in his life - President of ICID, President of IWRA, creator and Vice-president of WWC, senior advisor to CIDA in field of water resources - everywhere he introduced new ideas, new initiative, new approaches and huge scope of humanity and international friendship. He was initiator of the program in Central Asia water - “Program of IWRM in Central Asia, organizing Training Centre of ICWC, project “Adaptation to climate change”. Memory of this brilliant and wise person will live with everybody who knew and met with him.

Prof. Benedito Braga, President, World Water Council

This is really very sad news. Aly Shady was a man of great vision and at the same time an implementer. Few people have these two virtues together. He was a good friend and a great supporter of important initiatives such as the creation the World Water Council. The World Water Council is mourning the loss of one of its more prominent members and we pray for his soul.

Dr. Loïc Fouchon, Ex- President World Water Council

Allow me to pay tribute to the memory of a prominent researcher, scientist, and leader of renowned institutions within the water community. Ali Shady was actively involved in the creation of the World Water Council, and served as Vice-President. He was also one of the first, alongside Mahmoud Abu Zeid, to imagine a "global water village", now recognised on a political level.

Dr. Jun Xia, President, IWRA

He was one of the founders of the World Water Council and subsequently occupied the positions of Treasurer, Vice President and Governor. It was under his leadership that the World Water Forums moved from a relatively modest 400 participant event in Marrakech to 5,000 attendees in The Hague in the year 2000. 

Aly was a man of great talent and broad vision, and was committed to the institutions he led. We are sad to learn of his untimely passing.

Dr. Shahrizaila bin Abdullah, President Hon., ICID

It is with deep regret that we received the shocking news of the sad demise of PH Aly Shady, a dear friend and close associate for many years while serving together in ICID especially during the 1990s. I had the special pleasure to hand over the reins of the ICID Presidency to him during the ICID Congress hosted by the Egyptian National Committee held in Cairo in 1996. The late PH Aly's contributions has been ably captured and documented in the tribute. PH Aly's proactive, dedicated and exemplary services to ICID and his ever pleasant demeanour shall always be cherished.

My wife and I would like to join others from the ICID fraternity in conveying our heartfelt condolences to the bereaved family and also to members of CANCID. 

Dr. Keizrul Abdullah, President Hon., ICID

I am sad to hear that the ICID family has lost one of her most distinguished and dedicated son. President Honoraire Aly Shady was one of the great heros of the water community and in particular for the irrigation sector.It will be impossible to find a successor who can adequately fill in his footprint. I have known Aly as a mentor, colleague and most of all as a friend for the past three decades and I will miss his presence, advice and homily chats. Please convey my condolences to President Hon. Aly's family.

Peter S. Lee, President Hon., ICID 

My wife, Maureen and I were very saddened by the passing away of President Honoraire Aly Shady. We first met Aly when he visited our house in Hyderabad, Pakistan in 1982, and we continued our friendship through ICID ever since.  We in ICID have much to thank Aly for his guidance, and he is the rightful father of many reforms that have made ICID a leader in its field.  God bless you Aly and thank you.

Benjamín De León Mojarro, General Secretary (MEXCID)

The Mexican National Committee (MEXCID) of the ICID regret the sudden demise of Mr. Aly Shady and offer its most profound condolences to his family and to the Canadian National Committee of ICID.

R. Wayne Skaggs, Professor, North Carolina State University

I am so sorry to learn of Aly's passing. We are all poorer today for the loss of this most accomplished man. He did so much and helped so many. I was privileged to know him and to associate with him over the span of both of our careers. The impact of Aly's work is very well documented by the outstanding tribute.

Condolence messages were also received from the National Committees of Nepal, Pakistan, UK, ENCID, and INACID

Robert S. Broughton, Ph.D., P.Eng., Emeritus Professor of Agricultural Engineering, Macdonald Campus of McGill University.

In this personal tribute given beneath, Dr. Broughton shares some of his memories of meetings with late Aly Shady and jobs they worked on together.  

My earliest memory of Aly M. Shady, is from the spring of 1970, when Aly came to meet with him to discuss the possibility of doing Master of Science studies in Agricultural Engineering and qualifying for membership in the Ordre des Ingenieurs du Quebec and the Association of Professional Engineers of Ontario.  Besides his Bachelor of Science studies in the Faculty of Agriculture of Cairo University and his Agricultural Extension work in the Nile Delta of Egypt, followed by his water management studies in Italy, subsequent immigration to Canada and his work in a chemistry laboratory at the Universite de Montreal, Aly obviously had linguistic skills as well as scientific knowledge. He had acquired considerable knowledge of Italian, French and English as well as his native Arabic.  After reviewing the transcripts of his studies, I was happy to recommend Aly’s admission to McGill for studies toward a Master of Science Degree in Agricultural Engineering. 

The Master of Science program would take 2.7 years as Aly was required to take several undergraduate courses in mathematics and engineering subjects to complete the pre-qualifications for future Registration as a Professional Engineer in Quebec and Ontario, as well as the post graduate courses for the M.Sc. In the summers of 1971 and 1972 Aly worked as a Research Assistant on an environmental project that provided the data for his M.Sc. Thesis under the supervision of Professor John Ogilvie, Ph.D., P.Eng.

In the spring of 1973 Aly joined a team with George Eades, Colin Baker and Peter Havard, who worked on field surveys, preparing plans and inspecting the installation of subsurface and surface drainage systems for farms in the National Capital Commission Greenbelt around Ottawa. I was the manager of this project under a contract between McGill and the NCC.  Aly continued to work as the Senior Field Engineer on this project and other McGill projects until 1977 when he moved to Ottawa to commence working on a contract with The Canadian International Development Agency, CIDA. In 1976 the other McGill projects included: a) first International Postgraduate course on Drainage Engineering with visiting Professor Gordon Spoor from the National College of Agricultural Engineering, Silsoe, Bedford, England; b) an inspection of the proposed route for new pipelines to bring oil and natural gas through farm lands of western Quebec across the Ottawa River to the northeast end of Montreal; Aly made diagrams and recommendations for minimizing problems with farm and municipal drainage systems along the routes of the pipelines; c) Aly co-authored a paper for American Society of Civil Engineers conference in Ottawa and helped with the field study tour for that conference; d) Aly helped with the design and inspection of installation of some new drainage systems on the Macdonald Campus farm.

In the summer of 1981 Aly called on me to assist him with part of a Study Tour of Irrigation and Drainage and projects in Ontario and Quebec for four Senior Engineer / Project Managers from the Water and Power Development Authority of Pakistan (WAPDA). This was followed up by Aly and his colleagues at CIDA and the Canadian Embassy in Islamabad arranging for five Canadian Agricultural Engineers to go to Pakistan in November 1981 to see some of the Salinity Control and Reclamation Projects that were in the planning and implementation stages in Sindh, Punjab and Northwest Frontier Provinces. This led to Aly and his Colleagues arranging for many Canadians to cooperate with Pakistanis to make big contributions in field investigations, research, training, planning, design and implementation on several large Salinity Control and Reclamation Projects over the next two decades that significantly increased food production capabilities on more than 300,000 hectares of crop lands.

Between 1981 and 1997 Aly provided information and helped make arrangements for many Canadians to cooperate and participate with Egyptians on many aspects of Irrigation, Drainage and Flood Control Projects. The projects with which I participated were the Integrated Soil and Water Improvement Project (ISAWIP) and the Cairo-McGill Soil and Water Management (CAMSAWM) project.

The ISAWIP project included field investigations, scientific research, on-the-job training, design and construction of drainage and irrigation facilities for some 50,000 hectares of land in Dakhaliya Governorate. The project included the design and construction of a factory to produce plastic pipes for drainage and irrigation, and the supply of trenching machines and pipe fabrication machines from Canada. This project has improved the food and fiber production capabilities of an important part of Dakhaliya and the livelihoods and future food supply for hundreds of thousands of Egyptians. Many Canadians and Egyptians acquired new knowledge, capabilities and skills on this project.

The CAMSAWM project was a co-operation between Cairo and McGill Universities on teaching and research in soil and water sciences and engineering. This project operated between 1988 and 1994.

In the 1990s Aly and his colleagues at CIDA engaged me and many other Canadians for various durations of participation on many aspects of the Rajasthan Agricultural Drainage Research Project (The RAJAD Project). This was the largest drainage Research project in the world. It involved soil and water management research aspects over an area of more than 15 000 hectares in the Rajasthan State of India.

The knowledge, skill, guidance, vigour and inspiration that Aly brought to these projects in Pakistan, Egypt and India, over the two decades that I was occasionally involved, were extraordinary beyond measure. Concurrently with the projects named above, Aly assisted with many other CIDA  projects.

Aly moved rapidly from the position of being a Student and Research Assistant in the early 1970s to a position where he gave challenging assignments to some of his former McGill Professors, and Professors, Scientists and Engineers from other locations. Aly’s assignments helped them to become better teachers for our current and subsequent students and employees. They can all be thankful for Aly’s leadership and guidance in implementing parts of some difficult, complex, projects that provided the capability for much increased food production in several needy areas of the world while concurrently increasing the knowledge and skills of large numbers of persons in Canada and the project countries.

Concurrently with his work at CIDA, Aly participated professionally with the Canadian National Committee on Irrigation and Drainage (CANCID) which is affiliated with the International Commission on Irrigation and Drainage (ICID). The small part of this CANCID activity in which Dr. Broughton was able to provide a little background help to Aly were the ICID Council meetings in Ottawa in May-June 1989 and the ICID Congress in Montreal in 2002. Aly’s, energetic, thoughtful, inspirational work before and during these events was immense and contributed much to the success of these events that had both Canadian and international benefits.

İrfan AKER, DOLSAR, Turkey

It was a great shock for us to be informed about the sudden death of Mr. Aly Shady.

I had the privilege of meeting him at various occasions.He was always ready to help/assist/advice. He was a great leader of international Water Community.'

We will never forget him. We are going to miss him.