Abstract: To explore the impacts of climate change on climatic suitability of banana planting in Guangdong Province, we analyzed climate data from 86 meteorological stations in Guangdong Province during 1961 to 2022, including annual mean temperature (T_y), ≥10 ℃ annual accumulated temperature (T_a), average minimum temperature in January (T₁), annual extreme minimum temperature (T_min), and days with daily minimum temperature ≤5 ℃ (D≤5 ℃). The impacts of climate change on climatic suitability of banana planting were assessed by combining with the changes of five key climate factors for the periods of 1961-1990, 1971-2000, 1981-2010, 1991-2020, before (1961-1997) and after (1998-2022) T_y mutation. The results showed that T_y, T_a, T₁, and T_min showed a significant increasing trend with the rates of 0.2 ℃, 80.7 ℃·d, 0.4 ℃ and 0.4 ℃ per decade, respectively. D≤5 ℃ showed significant drop with a rate of 1.5 d per decade. T_y had mutation in the year of 1997. Generally, T_y, T_a, and T_min were higher in south than in north part, in plain than in mountain regions. D≤5 ℃ was lower in southern coastal regions than in northern mountainous regions. Except for the high and cold mountainous regions in northern Guangdong, T₁ in other regions met the heat requirements for bananas to overwinter. According to the climatic requirement of  banana growth and development, the climatic  division for banana planting in Guangdong Province could be divided into four regions: most-suitable region, suitable region, sub-suitable region, and unsuitable region. The most-suitable region was mainly distributed in western Guangdong. The suitable region was mainly located in eastern Guangdong and southern part of the Pearl River Delta. The sub-suitable region was mainly located in northern part of the Pearl River Delta and southern part of northern Guangdong. The unsuitable region was concentrated in northern part of northern Guangdong. Due to climate change, the area of most-suitable region showed obvious northward expansion and eastward movement, but the areas of suitable, sub-suitable, and unsuitable region decreased. Compared to that in 1961-1990, the area of most-suitable region in 1991-2020 increased by 3.45×10⁶ hm², but the areas of suitable, sub-suitable and unsuitable region decreased by 1.83×10⁶, 1.10×10⁶, and 0.52×10⁶ hm², respectively. The percentage of most-suitable region increased by 19.04 percentage point, but the percentages of suitable, sub-suitable and unsuitable region decreased by 8.29, 7.77, and 3.00 percentage point, respectively, after 1997 than that before in Guangdong Province.

Key words: climate change, division indicator, climatic suitability, abrupt climate change, climatic division, banana, Guangdong