LEARNING OBJECTIVES
After studying this chapter, you should be able to:

• Differentiate between qualitative and quantitative methods of forecasting.
• Carry out a trend analysis in time series data.
• Identify seasonal and cyclical patterns in time series data.
• Forecast using simple and weighted moving-average methods.
• Forecast using the exponential smoothing method.
• Forecast when the time series contains both trend and seasonality.
• Assess the efficiency of forecasting methods using measures of error.
• Make forecasts using templates.
• Compute index numbers.