Artificial Neural Network data collection

Description:
Hi there Unemployed Professors.

This project is a portion of a larger assignment.

This project on it"s own is the collection of 16 data sources from 2015 back to 1985 and converting them into quarterly figures to produce 123 data points for each of the 16 sources . Working data spreadsheet with what I have already compelted will be provided.

I plan to take the collated data produced by this project, run it through an ANN using MATLAB myself and post another project to Unemployed Professors with the results for written analysis.

Research Data

Data to be fed into the Import Demand forecast ANN is:
Tonnage as dependant variable
Independent variables for Import:
World air cargo yield or Revenue/Tonnage - World Air Cargo Gross Revenue
Crude Oil Prices
Jet Fuel Prices
World Merchandise Trade
Japan Real Gross Domestic Product
Japan’s unemployment (from Statistics Japan)
Narita Airport flight movements
Yen Foreign Exchange Rates against the US
World Interest Rates
Japan Interest Rates
Japan Population
World Population
World Unemployment
Japan Unemployment


Data to be fed into the Export Demand forecast ANN is:
Tonnage as dependant variable
Independent variables for export:
World Real Gross Domestic Product from IMF
World Merchandise Trade from WTO
World air cargo yield or Revenue/tonnage - World Air Cargo Gross Revenue
Crude Oil Prices
Jet Fuel Prices
World population data (world bank)
Narita Airport Flight Movements
Yen Foreign Exchange Rates against the US
World Interest Rates
Japan Interest Rates
Japan Population
World Unemployment
Japan Unemployment


Flight movements will be sourced from narita airport and will represent the total scheduled passenger and freighter aircraft movements (this will be the proxy for flights)

Sources of data for the ANN will come from:
WTO
IMF
Statitics Japan
Narita Airport
Other

Will need to ensure that annual data is broken down into quarterly data, and data sets go back as far as possible, preferably between 1985-2015.
Overall, the larger assignment I am in need of is a "Draft Journal Paper", culmination of 12 weeks of study as a Final year project. I say "draft" as I have every intention of reading and editing the work produced to ensure it carries my writing style and does not stand out as an exeption compared to my other work.

The title of the work will be:
"Modelling Air Cargo Demand of Narita International Airport using an Artificial Neural Network approach."

Primary Objective

To apply an Artificial Neural Network to forecast Narita International Airport"s Import air cargo demand and Export air cargo demand.

Secondary Questions

1. What is the optimum Artificial Neural Network and is that a better model then contemporary models? How does using an Artificial Neural Network model of predicting future air cargo demand compare to ICAO"s contemporary modelling?

2. What are the major independent variables, and their relative weightings, that influence the Import demand and Export demand for air cargo at Narita International Airport when using an Artificial Neural Network? How significant is World Air Cargo Yield as a predictor variable in forecast Narita International Airport"s Export and Import Air Cargo demand in an ANN model?

3. When forecasting Narita International Airport"s annual export air cargo demand, which is a better predictor variable in the Artificial Neural Network models: World Real GDP or World Merchandise Trade?

4. What are the outputs for this Artificial Neural Network?