Accuracy Assessment of Pistachio Climate Suitability Map Based on ROC Curve

The aim of this study was to evaluate the accuracy of the climate suitability map of pistachio planting in the northwestern provinces of the country. Accordingly, the climate suitability map of pistachio planting was prepared based on long-term meteorological data using weighted overlap modeling in GIS environment. The accuracy of the mentioned map was evaluated by comparing it with the pistachio orchards map that located in this area using the Receiver Operating Curve (ROC). The results showed that 33, 33.4, 60 and 12.4% of the study area in East and West Azerbaijan, Kurdistan, and Ardabil provinces are suitable for pistachio cultivation respectively. The area under the curve (AUC) for the mentioned provinces were calculated as 0.9, 0.8, 0.9, and 0.62, respectively, which in general indicates the high accuracy of the results. In Ardabil province, insufficient attention to the limitation of high relative humidity in different stages of pollination, and fruit growth in the construction of pistachio orchards has caused a low area AUC. Citing the results of the climate suitability of pistachio cultivation map can be a good guide for site selection of new orchards and therefore, the reduction of crop yield due to climatic hazards will be minimized.