They also find that tropical deforestation over 2001-20 exposed 345 million people to “local warming”, in addition to the warming they were already facing due to global warming. However, tropical forest loss is on the rise. A record 6.7 million hectares of previously intact tropical forest was lost last year, mainly due to fires and land clearing for agriculture. Forest warming Tropical deforestation has a wide range of negative consequences, including decreasing biodiversity, releasing carbon into the atmosphere and threatening the safety of Indigenous communities. The chart below shows the average annual deaths due to deforestation-induced heat per 100,000 people living in areas of forest loss.