Optimal route tour of the Regional Capitals in Ghana case study: West African Examinations Council’s question papers depot inspection plan

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2014-10-17
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The travelling salesman problem is considered to be a classic example of what is known as a tour problem. Essentially, any type of tour problem involves making a series of stops along a designated route and making a return journey without ever making a second visit to any previous stop. Generally, a tour problem is present when there is concern on making the most of available resources such as time and mode of travel to accomplish the most in results. The objective of the thesis is to use Simulated Annealing to determine the optimal route for visiting all the ten regions in Ghana, save time and minimize expenditure. This study formulated a real-life problem of WAEC as a TSP, modelled as network problem and a matlab program was prepared using simulated annealing algorithm in solving the problem. It was observed that the route that gave minimum achievable inspection plan was 3 – 9 – 6 – 10 – 8 – 5 – 2 – 4 – 7 – 1 at the minimum distance of 2229 km. Thus; Koforidua → Ho → Tamale → Bolgatanga → Wa → Sunyani → Kumasi → Takoradi → Cape Coast → Accra Hence an officer assigned to inspect the various question paper depots can start from Accra and end in Accra following the order above.
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A thesis submitted to the Institute of Learning, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the award of the Master of Science degree in Industrial Mathematics.
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