Machine learning techniques to predict daily rainfall amount

Abstract Predicting the amount of daily rainfall improves agricultural productivity and secures food and water supply to keep citizens healthy. To predict rainfall, several types of research have been conducted using data mining and machine learning techniques of different countries’ environmental datasets. An erratic rainfall distribution in the country affects the agriculture on which the economy of the country depends on. Wise use of rainfall water should be planned and practiced in the country to minimize the problem of the drought and flood occurred in the country. The main objective of this study is to identify the relevant atmospheric features that cause rainfall and predict the intensity of daily rainfall using machine learning techniques. The Pearson correlation technique was used to select relevant environmental variables which were used as an input for the machine learning model. The dataset was collected from the local meteorological office at Bahir Dar City, Ethiopia to measure the performance of three machine learning techniques (Multivariate Linear Regression, Random Forest, and Extreme Gradient Boost). Root mean squared error and Mean absolute Error methods were used to measure the performance of the machine learning model. The result of the study revealed that the Extreme Gradient Boosting machine learning algorithm performed better than others.