mbuguakevvz/kenya-demand-forecast

Demand Forecasting & Inventory Optimization Pipeline for Kenyan Retail # Kenya Demand Forecasting & Inventory Optimization ## Project Overview An end-to-end data science pipeline that forecasts retail demand and optimizes inventory for Kenyan businesses. This project simulates real-world retail data, builds machine learning models, and provides actionable purchase recommendations. ## Business Problem Kenyan retailers face significant challenges: - **Stockouts** - Lost sales when popular items run out - **Overstocking** - Tied-up capital in excess inventory - **Manual Planning** - Time-consuming Excel-based forecasting - **Unknown Demand** - No visibility into future sales patterns ## Solution This pipeline provides: - **2-Year Demand Forecast** (2027-2028) - **Optimal Inventory Levels** - Minimize holding costs - **Weekly Purchase Recommendations** - When and how much to order - **95% Service Level** - Balance between stockouts and overstocking ## Technical Architecture ### Data Generation - Simulated Kenyan retail data (2023-2025) - Realistic patterns: weekends, holidays, month-end payday effects - Kenyan regions and product categories ### ETL Pipeline - Data cleaning and transformation - Feature engineering (time features, lags, rolling statistics) - Data aggregation for forecasting ### Machine Learning - **Model**: LightGBM (Gradient Boosting) - **Features**: 24+ time-based and lag features - **Horizon**: 2 years (730 days) - **Performance**: High accuracy with business-relevant metrics ### Inventory Optimization - **Safety Stock**: Buffer against demand uncertainty - **Reorder Point**: When to place new orders - **EOQ**: Economic Order Quantity - **Purchase Orders**: Weekly actionable recommendations ## Key Results ### Demand Forecast | Metric | 2027 | 2028 | |--------|------|------| | Total Sales | KSh 80.35M | KSh 80.36M | | Daily Average | KSh 220,150 | KSh 219,558 | | Best Month | January (KSh 6.97M) | January (KSh 6.81M) | | Worst Month | February (KSh 6.20M) | February (KSh 6.17M) | ### Inventory Optimization | Met …