EVALUATING INVESTMENT FINANCIAL PROJECTS USING ARTIFICIAL NEURAL NETWORKS: APPLIED RESEARCH IN THE MINISTRY OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

Abstract

The current research aims at examining the effectiveness index as an approach towards investment project appraisal, paying special attention to such an instrument of financial management as Neural Networks (NN). It aims at identifying the extent to which the effectiveness index and NN could help the Iraqi Ministry of Science and Technology in the process of evaluating investment projects in different industries. Among other aspects, this research also focuses on the main issues related to using the effectiveness index for decision making and the possibility of applying NN methods in public investment appraisal. It should be noted that one of the basic assumptions of this research is that the combined use of the effectiveness index and NN contributes to the improvement of investment projects evaluation. Based on the results of interview and analytical studies, it was found out that the effectiveness index reflects the degree of achievement of project goals accurately while NN demonstrates high operational efficiency being able to predict events with up to 98% of probability in case of incomplete data.