Based on monthly data of the mean temperature and precipitation during 1961-2008 from the Xingren Meteorological Station in Zhongwei City

Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region

the climate potential productivity and its changes were calculated by using the Miami model and Thornthwaite Memorial model. The results indicated that:(1) The average temperature clearly tended to increase

and the precipitation fluctuated significantly and tended to decrease

which showed that the climate type becoming warm and dry.(2) The temperature potential productivity increased year by year while the precipitation potential productivity and climate potential productivity decreased with fluctuation.(3) The precipitation was highly linearly related to climate potential productivity

but average temperature had no obvious linear correlation to climate potential productivity. The average temperature potential productivity was 2.79 and 2.35 times of that of the precipitation and climate

which indicated that precipitation was the key factor that restricted the climate potential productivity around Xiangshan Mountain.(4) Through scenario analysis of future climate changes

it is found to be warm-dry-type climate as a whole

which is unfavorable for agricultural production around Xiangshan Mountain. Thus

the technology of water-saving agriculture should be rapidly developed to ensure the agricultural production.