FLOODING over the past week in China's south has killed 37 people, left six missing, and forced almost half a million from their homes, officials say.

The seasonal rains have fallen especially hard on the country's manufacturing hub of Guangdong province near Hong Kong, where 17 of the deaths were reported.

At least 25,000 homes have been destroyed by the flood waters and at least 440,000 people have been displaced, the Ministry of Civil Affairs said in a statement on its website on Monday.

More thunderstorms were forecast for Guangdong on Tuesday.

China's worst floods in recent history were in 1998, when 4150 people died, most of them along the Yangtze River, China's mightiest.

The massive Three Gorges Dam has largely contained Yangtze flooding but the problem persists in the south and north.