In medieval Europe, for example, deforestation led to fuelwood shortages which in turn led people to burn dung and straw. This robbed farmland of essential nutrients and a collapse in crop yields which left people in an already weakened state when the Black Death arrived. Some effects of deforestation would cause further destruction of forests. Disruption of atmospheric balances leading to climatic change will kill many trees since they cannot adapt quickly to the new weather patterns. In the background pollutants such as acid rain continue to take their toll too.
Various factors are at work in the destruction of the world's forests.
Their significance varies from one time and place to another. It is simplistic, however, to blame everything upon the rich industrialised countries. The assault upon Amazonia commenced in the 1930s and today is still driven to a considerable extent by purely domestic forces. Yet the enormous per capita demand for timber and pulp amongst the richer sections of world society plays a critical role in the felling of more and more old growth forests, both in temperate and tropical regions as well as their replacement by biologically impoverished plantations. It might be remembered that felling rates are greater in, say, British Columbia, than Brazil.