GIVEN-CHINYAMA/zambia_fuel_price_forecasting

A comparative time series analysis of Zambia's petrol and diesel prices using ARIMA, SARIMA, Holt-Winters, and Prophet models. Data sourced from the Energy Regulation Board (ERB) of Zambia. # ⛽ Zambia Fuel Price Forecasting ## A Comparative Time Series Analysis of Petrol and Diesel Prices ### Using ARIMA · SARIMA · Holt-Winters · Prophet --- > **Author:** Given Chinyama > **Institution:** Kwame Nkrumah University > **Date:** May 2026 > **GitHub:** github.com --- --- ## 👆 Click "Open in Colab" Above to View the Full Notebook > GitHub cannot render large notebooks with embedded visualisations. Click the **Open in Colab** button above to view the complete project with all code, outputs, and professional charts. --- ## 📊 Results Summary ### Petrol Forecast Performance | Model | RMSE (K/litre) | MAE (K/litre) | MAPE | R² | |-------|---------------|--------------|------|-----| | ARIMA(1,1,0) | 12.91 | 10.76 | 28.26% | -2.43 | | SARIMA(1,1,0)(0,0,0,12) | 12.95 | 10.80 | 28.37% | -2.45 | | Holt-Winters | 20.56 | 17.25 | 45.44% | -7.71 | | **Prophet** | **3.77** | **3.14** | **9.54%** | **0.71** | ### Diesel Forecast Performance | Model | RMSE (K/litre) | MAE (K/litre) | MAPE | R² | |-------|---------------|--------------|------|-----| | ARIMA(1,1,0) | 12.65 | 10.58 | 28.68% | -2.50 | | SARIMA(1,1,0)(0,0,0,12) | 12.69 | 10.62 | 28.80% | -2.52 | | Holt-Winters | 20.09 | 16.86 | 45.84% | -7.82 | | **Prophet** | **3.64** | **3.02** | **9.52%** | **0.71** | > 🏆 **Prophet achieved the best performance on all metrics for both Petrol and Diesel — 81%+ better RMSE than the worst model.** --- ## 📅 2025 Fuel Price Forecast (Prophet — Best Model, ZMW per litre) | Month | Petrol (K) | Diesel (K) | |-------|-----------|-----------| | January 2025 | 47.21 | 45.77 | | February 2025 | 48.17 | 46.69 | | March 2025 | 49.01 | 47.51 | | April 2025 | 50.05 | 48.51 | | May 2025 | 51.14 | 49.58 | | June 2025 | 52.28 | 50.68 | | July 2025 | 53.32 | 51.67 | | August 2025 | 54.43 | 52.76 | | September 2025 | 55.55 | 53.85 | | October 2025 | 56.52 | 54.80 | | November 2025 | 57.58 | 55.82 | | December 2025 | 58.42 | 56.62 | --- ## 📁 Project Overvi …