Market intelligence for cotton in Tamil Nadu Ammaan M., Sudha R., Anuradha P. CARDS, Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Coimbatore-3 Online published on 18 December, 2023. Abstract India is the largest producer of cotton and recently attained first largest exporter of cotton. Accuracy of crop price forecasting techniques is important because it enables the farmers and stakeholders to take appropriate actions by estimating market factors such as demand and supply. The present study is aimed to find the best fit model and forecasted prices validated with actual prices. Time series data for cotton were collected for the period of 2009 -2023 (fourteen years) from Konganapuram market and the future prices were predicted for 2019- 2023. During 2019-2023, DEMIC has provided Market Intelligence and disseminations for taking pre-sowing and pre harvest decisions on cotton. The cotton year is from October to September end. ARIMA model was employed to predict the future prices of cotton. ARIMA (1, 0, 0) model was found to be best for forecasting the price of cotton on the basis of minimum Akaike Information Criterion (AIC) and Schwarz Criterion (SBC). Forecast price shows that market prices of cotton have highest of Rs. 8,000 - 8,500 per quintal prevailed in August - October, 2022. The prices have lowest i.e. ‘Rs. 4,200 - 4,400 per q in July-August, 2021. Cotton pre-sowing and pre-harvest advisories are given with approximately 94-100 per cent of forecast validation. Top Keywords ACF, PACF, ARIMA, Seasonal Index, Forecasting, Moving average, Validation. Top |