Forecasting Impact
Forecasting Impact is a bimonthly podcast that aims to disseminate the science and practice of forecasting by introducing prominent academics, practitioners, and visionaries in the forecasting domain. Our vision is to help grow the forecasting community, foster collaboration between academia, industry, and governments, and promote scientific forecasting and good practices.
We will discuss a range of forecasting topics in economics, supply chain, energy, social goods, AI, machine learning, data analytics, education, healthcare, and more.
Forecasting Impact episodes are also available on the IIF YouTube Channel @IIForecasters.
Podcast Team
Chair and Co-host: Dr. Laila Ahadi-Akhlaghi, Senior Technical Advisor at JSI.
Additional co-hosts:
- Dr. Mahdi Abolghasemi, Lecturer in Data Science at The University of Queensland,
- George Boretos, Founder & CEO at FutureUP,
- Dr. Faranak Golestaneh, Data Science Senior Manager at Commonwealth Bank of Australia,
- Mariana Menchero, Senior Forecaster at Nixtla, and
- Arian Sultan Khan, Data Analyst at VAN
Co-hosts in the past have included: Michał Chojnowski, Shari De Baets, Elaine Deschamps, Dr. Sevvandi Kandanaarachchi, Bahman Rostami-Tabar, Anna Sroginis, and Sarah Van der Auweraer.
We welcome your feedback, questions, and suggestions. Please contact us at forecastingimpact@forecasters.org
Forecasting Impact
Food Bank Forecasting with Professor Lauren B. Davis
This episode of Forecasting Impact features Professor Lauren B. Davis discussing her research on applying stochastic modeling and forecasting to food bank operations. Lauren shares how she began forecasting with a local food bank, which led her to focus on forecasting the highly uncertain supply of food donations. She details the food banks' donation sourcing process, the management of their supply chains, and the application of models like exponential smoothing, support vector regression, and ensemble methods to predict donation volumes.
Professor Davis addresses challenges in forecasting at various aggregation levels (network vs. location-specific), using optimization models for equitable allocation of limited supply, and the significance of storage and agency capacity limits. She emphasizes the importance of equity as an objective, the complexity of modeling true demand, and the crucial role of visual analytics and co-design with food bank partners. The episode underscores the practical impact of forecasting in humanitarian supply chains and the necessity of linking models with operational decisions.