Does designing environmental sustainability disclosure quality measures make a difference?

The authors would like to thank the editor (Professor Richard Welford) and the two anonymous reviewers of the journal for their constructive comments and valuable suggestions on earlier versions of the paper. The authors also acknowledge the financial support of the Faculty of Commerce, Damanhour University, Egypt.Peer reviewedPostprin

Assessing the Anti-Corruption Disclosure Practices in the UK FTSE 100 Extractive Firms

Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Exploring the quality of corporate environmental reporting : Surveying Preparers’ and Users’ Perceptions

The authors would like to thank the editor (Professor Lee Parker) and the anonymous reviewers of the journal for their constructive comments and valuable suggestions on earlier versions of the paper. The first author also acknowledges the financial support of Damanhour University, Egypt.Peer reviewedPostprin

Qur’anic Ethics for Environmental Responsibility: Implications for Business Practice

Despite the growing interest in examining the role of religious beliefs as a guide towards environmental conscious actions, there is still a lack of research informed by an analysis of divine messages. This deficiency includes the extent to which ethics for environmental responsibility are promoted within textual divine messages; types of environmental themes promoted within the text of divine messages; and implications of such religious environmental ethics for business practice. The present study attempts to fill this gap by conducting a thorough content analysis of environmental themes within the divine message of Muslims (the Qur’an) focusing on their related ethical aspects and business implications. The analysis has revealed 675 verses in 84 chapters throughout all 30 parts of the Qur’an, with environmental content relating to the core components of the natural world, i.e. human beings, water, air, land, plants, animals, and other natural resources. This environmental content and its related ethics are grounded on the belief that humans are vicegerents of God on the earth and their behaviours and actions are motivated by earthly and heavenly rewards. Implications of these findings for different sectors/businesses are also highlighted

Environmental Reporting of British Food Industry a Critical Analysis

This research based book gives special consideration to environmental reporting practices in a sample of six companies representing the largest companies in both food retailing and processing sectors (FRS & FPS respectively) in the UK. This has been achieved through reviewing the corporate social and environmental reporting and disclosing practices' literature and in-depth empirical analyses using two methods. The first is a trend analysis (TA) of the corporate environmental reporting practices over a five-year period. Second, a content analysis (CA), of the number of words and pages, was conducted on the current corporate environmental reporting practice as part of corporate social and/or responsibility reports.The results of the five years' TA show that the volume of environmental reporting of FRS is found to be statistically higher than that of FPS. The quality of environmental information is assessed by the extent that the report includes narrative and quantitative information, visual tools and environmental policy, environmental targets, environmental initiatives, etc. It was found that FRS publishes high quality environmental information compared with of the FPS

Exploring the Status Quo of Adopting the 17 UN SDGs in a Developing Country—Evidence from Vietnam

This paper develops the multiple-theoretical framework of legitimacy, stakeholders, and voluntary perspective to assess the adoption of Vietnamese listed firms to the 17 United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The paper’s primary objective is to use content analysis to discover the status quo of the SDGs practices of the largest 100 Vietnamese listed firms on the two biggest Vietnamese stock exchanges (Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange–HOSE and Hanoi Stock Exchange–HNX). By drawing a unique framework, the paper contributes to the extant literature review of SDG-related research. Our research framework enables corporate decision-makers significantly access corporate SDG adoptions and the implementation process. With the direct pressure of stakeholders, high environmental sensitivity industries are keen on disclosing SDG-related information. Notwithstanding, the findings reveal that Vietnamese listed firms indicate “green talks” in their corporate reporting rather than “green actions”. Thus, our findings encourage firms to engage in SDGs through substantive sustainability strategies and need greater attention from governments, practitioners, and policymakers

Editorial for the Special Issue “Corporate Governance, Social Responsibility, Innovation, and Sustainable Business Development Goals”

Corporate governance, social responsibility, and innovation play an important role in achieving sustainable business development goals (SDGs) [...

Assessing the measurement of quality of corporate environmental reporting

An increasing number of companies are reporting their environmental performance, impacts, and activities. The objectives of such reports are many including, in particular, reacting to external pressures from company stakeholders demanding more information about environmental performance. This might also be matched by management requiring information to better run the business - hence an internal requirement for information that would then be available for publication. Because, this environmental reporting serves multiple objectives and satisfies different needs of different readers, it varies in the type of information provided, the scope and depth of material disclosed, presentation formats used, the credibility of the information provided and its overall quality. Although richness of report content, scope of topics covered, presentation and credibility of this content have all been used to assess the quality of corporate environmental reporting (CER), to date most prior studies have looked simply at the volume of and/or the types of information when assessing the quality of CER. Studies have used two main indices to measure disclosure quality; subjective analysts' indices and semi-objective indices. Subjective indices such as the Association of Investment Management and Research (AIMR), formerly the Financial Analysts Federation (FAF) disclosure ratings, are built on corporate disclosures' ratings weighted by a panel of leading analysts in each industry. In semi-objective indices, on the other hand, a pre-determined list of items (topics of disclosure) is developed and tested for their presence (absence ) and/or the richness of their content. It is noted that most disclosure studies adopt this second approach in the form of disclosure index studies, a partial type of content analysis. Other disclosure measures have included textual analysis such as thematic content analysis, readability studies, and linguistic analysis. However, there is no consensus about the best measure for assessing reporting quality. One of the most important limitations encountered in the disclosure literature is the difficulty in assessing the quality of disclosure (Healy and Palepu, 2001; Urquiza et al., 2009). For example, these studies identify three key limitations. Firstly, there is inherent subjectivity involved in the selection of the quality measure and in the coding scheme to assess this 'quality' generally researchers choose their own methods or proxies. Secondly, there is an ignorance of the quality perceptions of preparers and users of corporate disclosure. Hammond and Miles (2004) argue that we cannot assess the quality of disclosure independently of a detailed understanding of users' need of disclosure. Thirdly, it has been common to use annual reports (ARs) to assess the extent and quality of corporate responsibility disclosure, ignoring the other reporting media such as corporate responsibility reports (CRRs), websites, home advertisings, etc (Forst et al., 2005; KPMG, 2011). Thus considering the fact that robust, reliable, and replicable quality assessment is problematic, the objectives of this research are threefold. Firstly, to build a more representative quality model based on the findings of a questionnaire ascertaining the views of both preparers and distinct categories of readers of ARs and/or CRRs. Secondly, to apply this model to FTSE 100 CER in both ARs and CRRs to ascertain whether the proxies frequently used in prior literature yield similar results to those derived from this more complex model. Thirdly, to investigate whether the common use of ARs, rather than more detailed CRRs in assessing CER quality is giving a misleading picture of the level and richness of disclosure available to stakeholders.EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo