Vegetable prices in Serbia: Tendencies and forecasting

Abstract

The subject of this paper is analysis of the tendencies and forecast of the prices of most significant vegetable crops in Serbia: potato, bean, tomato, pepper, onion, cabbage and watermelon. The aim of the paper is to forecast the absolute prices of the studied vegetables. Time series analysis of vegetable prices expressed in curo per ton (2002-17) was performed by means of descriptive statistics, while adequate ARIMA models were used for price forecasting (2018-22). The analysis of the studied vegetable crops showed that bean had the highest average annual price, while watermelon had the lowest. The price of tomato showed the highest fluctuations over the years, while the lowest were for onion and cabbage. All vegetable crops showed a tendency of absolute increase in prices expressed in euro. Based on the foregoing, it can be concluded that the market position of vegetables is generally improving, but oscillations will continue to occur. (C) 2019 EA. All rights reserved.