Abstract:
This research presents a deep learning approach for predicting durian prices using Bidirectional Long Short-Term Memory
(BiLSTM) networks with seasonal analysis. The study addresses two critical challenges in agricultural price forecasting which
include handling missing values in seasonal time series data and capturing complex temporal dependencies. The proposed
methodology employs Prophet model for missing value imputation incorporating multiple seasonal components and Fourier
terms to maintain temporal integrity. A BiLSTM architecture is implemented with a 25-day sliding window optimized to capture
market cycles and seasonal patterns. Therefore, the model is evaluated using 10-fold cross-validation on durian price data from
Thailand’s primary trading hub during 2023-2024 harvest seasons. The findings demonstrate strong predictive performance
with R-squared values of 0.9254 ± 0.0439 on validation data and Mean Squared Error of 65.3470 ± 33.1819. The model
successfully captures key market phases including initial stability, early decline, mid-season plateau and peak season dynamics.
The integration of seasonal features with bidirectional processing enables accurate prediction of price movements providing
valuable insights for stakeholders across the durian supply chain.