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- ANNEX D
- (to Recommendation E.506)
- Example of a top down modelling method
- The model for forecasting telephone traffic from Norway to the European
- countries is divided into two separate parts. The first step is an econometric
- model for the total traffic from Norway to Europe. Thereafter, we apply a model
- for the breakdown of the total traffic on each country.
- D.1 Econometric model of the total traffic from Norway to Europe
- With an econometric model we try to explain the development in telephone
- traffic, measured in charged minutes, as a function of the main explanatory
- variables. Because of the lack of data for some variables, such as tourism, these
- variables have had to be omitted in the model.
- The general model may be written:
- Xt = eK . eq GNP \s(a,t) . eq P \s(b,t) . eq A \s(c,t) . eut (t =
- 1, 2, . . ., N) (D-1)
- where:
- Xt is the demand for telephone traffic from Norway to Europe at time t
- (charged minutes).
- GNPt is the gross national product in Norway at time t (real prices).
- Pt is the index of charges for traffic from Norway to Europe at time t
- (real prices).
- At is the percentage direct-dialled telephone traffic from Norway to
- Europe (to take account of the effect of automation). For
- statistical reasons (i.e. impossibility of taking logarithm of
- zero) At goes from 1 to 2 instead of from 0 to 1.
- K is the constant.
- a is the elasticity with respect to GNP.
- b is the price elasticity.
- c is the elasticity with respect to automation.
- ut is the stochastic variable, summarizing the impact of those
- variables that are not explicitly introduced in the model and whose
- effects tend to compensate each other (expectation of ut = 0 and
- var ut = s2).
- By applying regression analysis (OLSQ) we have arrived at the coefficients
- (elasticities) in the forecasting model for telephone traffic from Norway to
- Europe given in Table D-1/E.506 (in our calculations we have used data for the
- period 1951-1980).
- The t statistics should be compared with the Student's Distribution with N
- - d degrees of freedom, where N is the number of observations and d is the number
- of estimated parameters. In this example, N = 30 and d = 4.
- The model "explains" 99.7% of the variation in the demand for telephone
- traffic from Norway to Europe in the period 1951-1980.
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- Fascicle II.3 - Rec. E.506 PAGE1
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- From this logarithmic model it can be seen that:
- - an increase in GNP of 1% causes an increase in the telephone traffic of
- 2.80%,
- - an increase of 1% in the charges, measured in real prices, causes a
- decrease in the telephone traffic of 0.26%, and
- - an increase of 1% in At causes an increase in the traffic of 0.29%.
- We now use the expected future development in charges to Europe, in GNP,
- and in the future automation of traffic to Europe to forecast the development in
- telephone traffic from Norway to Europe from the equation:
- Xt = et-16.095 . GNPt2.80 . Ptu-0.26 . At0.29 (D-2)
- TABLE D-1/E.506
- Coefficients Estimated values t statistics
- K -16.095 -4.2
- a 2.799 8.2
- b - 0.264 -1.0
- c 0.290 2.1
- D.2 Model for breakdown of the total traffic from Norway to Europe
- The method of breakdown is first to apply the trend to forecast the
- traffic to each country. However, we let the trend become less important the
- further into the period of forecast we are, i.e. we let the trend for each
- country converge to the increase in the total traffic to Europe. Secondly, the
- traffic to each country is adjusted up or down, by a percentage that is equal to
- all countries, so that the sum of the traffic to each country equals the
- forecasted total traffic to Europe from equation (D-2).
- Mathematically, the breakdown model can be expressed as follows:
- Calculation of the trend for country i:
- Rit = bi + ai . t, i = 1, . . ., 34 t = 1, . . ., N (D-3)
- where
- Rit = eq \f( Xit,Xt), i.e country i's share of the total traffic to Europe.
- Xit is the traffic to country i at time t
- Xt is the traffic to Europe at time t
- t is the trend variable
- ai and bi are two coefficients specific to country i; i.e. ai is country i's
- trend. The coefficients are estimated by using regression analysis, and we have
- based calculations on observed traffic for the period 1966-1980.
- The forecasted shares for country i is then calculated by
- Rit = RiN + ai . (t - N) . e-eq \f(t-5,40) (D-4)
- where N is the last year of observation, and e is the exponential function.
- The factor e-eq \f(t-5,40) is a correcting factor which ensures that the
- growth in the telephone traffic to each country will converge towards the growth
- of total traffic to Europe after the adjustment made in Equation (D-6).
- To have the sum of the countries' shares equal one, it is necessary that
- eq \i\su(i, , ) Rit = 1 (D-5)
- This we obtain by setting the adjusted share, eq \x\to(R)it, equal to
- eq \x\to(R)it = Rit eq \f(1,\i\su(i, , )Rit) (D-6)
- Each country's forecast traffic is then calculated by multiplying the
- total traffic to Europe, Xt, by each country's share of the total traffic:
- Xit = eq \x\to(R)it x Xt (D-7)
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- PAGE4 Fascicle II.3 - Rec. E.506
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- D.3 Econometric model for telephone traffic from Norway to Central and South
- America, Africa, Asia, and Oceania.
- For telephone traffic from Norway to these continents we have used the
- same explanatory variables and estimated coefficients. Instead of gross national
- product, our analysis has shown that for the traffic to these continents the
- number of telephone stations within each continent are a better and more
- significant explanatory variable.
- After using cross-section/time-series simultaneous estimation we have
- arrived at the coefficients in Table D-2/E.506 for the forecasting model for
- telephone traffic from Norway to these continents (for each continent we have
- based our calculations on data for the period 1961-1980):
- TABLE D-2/E.506
- Coefficients Estimated values t statistics
- Charges -1.930 -5.5
- Telephone stations 2.009 4.2
- Automation 0.5 -
- We then have R2 = 0.96. The model may be written:
- Xkt = eK . (TSkt)2.009 . (Pkt)1.930 . (Akt)0.5 (D-8)
- where
- Xkt is the telephone traffic to continent k (k = Central America, .
- ., Oceania) at time t,
- eK is the constant specific to each continent. For telephone traffic
- from Norway to:
- Central America: K1 = -11.025
- South America: K2 = -12.62
- Africa: K3 = -11.395
- Asia: K4 = -15.02
- Oceania: K5 = -13.194
- TSkt is the number of telephone stations within continent k at time t,
- Pkt is the index of charges, measured in real prices, to continent k at
- time t, and
- Akt is the percentage direct-dialled telephone traffic to continent k.
- Equation (D-8) is now used - together with the expected future development
- in charges to each continent, future development in telephone stations on each
- continent and future development in automation of telephone traffic from Norway
- to the continent - to forecast the future development in telephone traffic from
- Norway to the continent.
- References
- [1] ABRAHAM (A.) and LEDOLTER (J.): Statistical methods for forecasting. J.
- Wiley, New York, 1983.
- [2] ALDRIN (M.): Forecasting time series with missing observations. Stat 15/86
- Norwegian Computing Center, 1986.
- [3] ANSLEY (C. F.) and KOHN (R.): Estimation, filtering and smoothing in state
- space models with incomplete specified initial conditions. The Annals of
- Statistics, 13, pp. 1286-1316, 1985.
- [4] BARHAM (S. Y.) and DUNSTAN (F. D. J.): Missing values in time series. Time
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- Fascicle II.3 - Rec. E.506 PAGE1
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- Series Analysis: Theory and Practice 2: Anderson, O. D., ed., pp. 25-41,
- North Holland, Amsterdam, 1982.
- [5] B╪LVIKEN (E.): Forecasting telephone traffic using Kalman Filtering:
- Theoretical considerations. Stat 5/86 Norwegian Computing Center, 1986.
- [6] CHEMOUIL (P.) and GARNIER (B.): An adaptive short-term traffic forecasting
- procedure using Kalman Filtering. XI International Teletraffic Congress,
- Kyoto, 1985.
- [7] HARRISON (P. J.) and STEVENS (C. F.): Bayesian forecasting. Journal of
- Royal Statistical Society. Ser B 37, pp. 205-228, 1976.
- [8] HARVEY (A. C.) and PIERSE (R. G.): Estimating missing observations in
- econometric time series. Journal of American Statistical As., 79, pp.
- 125-131, 1984.
- [9] JONES (R. H.): Maximum likelihood fitting of ARMA models to time series
- with missing observations. Technometrics, 22, No. 3, pp. 389-396, 1980.
- [10] JONES (R. H.): Time series with unequally spaced data. Handbook of
- Statistics 5. ed. Hannah, E. J., et al., pp. 157-177, North Holland,
- Amsterdam, 1985.
- [11] KRUITHOF (J.): Telefoonverkeersrekening. De Ingenieur, 52, No. 8, 1937.
- [12] MORELAND (J. P.): A robust sequential projection algorithm for traffic
- load forecasting. The Bell Technical Journal, 61, pp. 15-38, 1982.
- [13] PACK (C. D.) and WHITAKER (B. A.): Kalman Filter models for network
- forecasting. The Bell Technical Journal, 61, pp. 1-14, 1982.
- [14] STORDAHL (K.) and HOLDEN (L.): Traffic forecasting models based on top
- down and bottom up models. ITC 11, Kyoto, 1985.
- [15] SZELAG (C. R.): A short-term forecasting algorithm for trunk demand
- servicing. The Bell Technical Journal, 61, pp. 67-96, 1982.
- [16] TU (M.) and PACK (D.): Improved forecasts for local telecommunications
- network. 6th International Forecasting Symposium, Paris, 1986.
- [17] WRIGHT (D. H.): Forecasting irregularly spaced data: An extension of
- double exponential smoothing. Computer and Engineering, 10, pp. 135-147,
- 1986.
- [18] WRIGHT (D. H.): Forecasting data published at irregular time intervals
- using an extension of Holt's method. Management science, 32, pp. 499-510,
- 1986.
- [19] Table of international telex relations and traffic, ITU, Geneva,
- 1973-1984.
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- PAGE4 Fascicle II.3 - Rec. E.506
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