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This study aims to examine the effect of sustainability report quality (SRQ) on information risk. This research also aims to examine the effect of SRQ on stock market participation through information risk.

The research sample includes 120 firm-years listed on the Sri Kehati Index period of 2017–2021. The hypothesis test uses firm and industry effect regression analysis. SRQ is measured by the existence of a sustainability committee and external assurance. The information risk is measured by bid-ask spread. Stock market participation is measured by volume of stock trading.

Based on the data analysis, this investigation finds that SRQ reduces information risk. This research also finds that SRQ improves stock market participation by reducing information risk.

First, this examination gives new evidence of SRQ to promote information environment improvement. Second, this examination contributes to providing the role of SRQ in an emerging market, such as Indonesia. Third, this examination contributes to providing the evaluation standard for sustainability reporting quality in Indonesia, since Indonesia has no specific standard for the sustainability report. Fourth, this examination contributes to filling the previous gap.

Business has a critical part to play in transforming the global economy and society to achieve sustainable development. Many granular sustainability accounting and management tools have been offered. To systematize these piecemeal developments, this paper aims to develop a framework for analysis of the potential role of sustainability management accounting (SMA). The key challenge addressed is how SMA could be extended to support future-oriented, long-term, pro-active management of multiple issues to contribute towards strong sustainable development at the macro-economy level.

This conceptual paper examines SMA within a multi-level, context-action-transformation framework which can move organizations and society towards sustainability. Based on normative stakeholder theory, including concern for mainstreaming marginalized stakeholders, the paper discusses the role of SMA and how it can contribute necessary information to sustainable development of the company and beyond its boundaries.

Guided by a SMA framework linking context, action and transformation and normative stakeholder theory, which considers all stakeholders, the paper shows how the present lack of progress towards macro-level sustainable development can be addressed. This requires a focus on measuring and assessing positive impacts and forward-looking, long-term and proactive management of multiple sustainability issues as typified by the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

The paper distinguishes between two aspects of SMA – a focus on reducing unsustainability and a focus on transformations towards sustainability. It is observed that there is insufficient emphasis on the latter at present if SMA is to provide comprehensive support to achieving the SDGs. A set of supportive tools is presented as a guide to practice and future developments.

The paper considers how SMA can enable and support transformations towards sustainability at the macro- and meso-level. Different transformational challenges and opportunities are discussed. In particular, the need to balance consideration of time, proactivity and multiplicity, as highlighted in the SDGs, is identified as the central way forward for SMA.

This paper aims to conduct a systematic review of the literature on the quality of integrated reports (IR) and highlight the gaps in the existing research to provide directions and suggestions for future research.

This study was conducted through a systematic literature review using content analysis based on 40 papers from the Scopus, Web of Science and EBSCOhost databases on IR quality. While reading the full-text papers, the authors found six additional papers referenced by the literature being reviewed that were relevant to IR quality. Thus, there were 46 papers in the final review. The analysis begins with the definition and dimension of IR quality and theoretical lenses. Furthermore, this study outlines constructs or variables used in the previous literature.

The authors found that most studies used the quantitative method (41 papers or 89%). Five papers in the literature used qualitative methods (11%). Most researchers (34 papers or 72%) defined IR quality as consistent with the International Integrated Reporting Council framework, specifically the eight content elements. In particular, with the constructs that make up the quality of the IR, variations between researchers were found. Furthermore, there were some gaps that could be the directions for future research.

The literature that provides academic knowledge about IR quality is still limited, and research on IR is still growing. The literature review conducted by this study can provide an overview of the current research positions on the quality of IR and directions for future research in this area.

This study intends to show corporate executives a framework demonstrating the quality of corporate reporting. It can impact not only investors as a specific stakeholder group but also other stakeholder groups.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first literature review to examine the quality of IR, thus providing a map of current research to suggest directions for future research. Most of the previous literature reviews have been focused on integrated reporting (IR) in general and not quality.

The purpose of this study is to contribute to the discussion surrounding the definition of accounting proposed by Carnegie et al. (2021a, 2021b) and further elaborated by Carnegie et al. (2023) from/under an institutionalist political-economy (IPE) based foundation and to specifically extend this approach to the arena of social and environmental accounting (SEA).

By adopting an IPE approach to SEA, this study offers a critique of the use of the notion of capital to refer to nature and people in SEA frameworks and standards.

A SEA framework based on the capabilities approach is proposed based on the concepts of human capabilities and global commons for the purpose of preserving the commons and enabling the flourishing of present and future generations.

The proposed framework allows the engagement of accounting community, in particular SEA researchers, with and contribution to such well-established initiatives as the Planetary Boundaries framework and the human development reports initiative of the United Nations Development Programme.

Based on the capability approach, this study applies Carnegie et al.’s (2023) framework to SEA. This new approach more attuned to the pursuit of sustainable human development and the sustainable development goals, may contribute to turning accounting into a major positive force through its impacts on the world, expressly upon organisations, people and nature.

Food service establishments and online food delivery companies use a revenue share model based on a commission rate. Because of the asymmetry of bargaining power, many food service establishments are vulnerable to a high commission rate. What is missing in the ongoing discussion about the revenue share model is the perspective of food consumers, who are the third party in the multi-sided market.

Within a willingness-to-pay (WTP) framework, we study if food consumers have preferences for the commission rate charged by food delivery companies to food service establishments. With 456 random consumers in the United States, we conduct a controlled experiment in which information is used as treatment in two groups. In the first group, the provided information only relates to the revenue share model (i.e. economic). In the second group, participants also received information about price control initiatives (i.e. economic and political).

Based on WTP-space mixed logit model results, there is a significant effect of information on preferences for the commission rate. While participants in the control group exhibited no aversion to the commission rate, participants who received treatment had a significant and negative WTP. The magnitude of the effect is estimated at -$1.08 for participants in the first treatment and -$2.28 for participants in the second treatment.

To date there is no applied research on the preferences of consumers in the online food order and delivery industry with respect to upstream conditions (i.e. commission rates).

This paper aims to investigate the relationship between corporate environmental, social and governance (ESG) ratings and leverage manipulation and the moderating effects of internal and external supervision.

The authors draw on a sample of Chinese non-financial A-share-listed firms from 2013 to 2020 to explore the effect of ESG ratings on leverage manipulation. Robustness and endogeneity tests confirm the validity of the regression results.

ESG ratings inhibit leverage manipulation by improving social reputation, information transparency and financing constraints. This effect is weakened by internal supervision, captured by the ratio of institutional investor ownership, and strengthened by external supervision, captured by the level of marketization. The effect is stronger in non-state-owned firms and firms in non-polluting industries. The governance dimension of ESG exhibits the strongest effect, with comprehensive environmental governance ratings and social governance ratings also suppressing leverage manipulation.

Firms should strive to cultivate environmental awareness, fulfil their social responsibilities and enhance internal governance, which may help to strengthen the firm’s sustainability orientation, mitigate opportunistic behaviours and ultimately contribute to high-quality firm development. The top managers of firms should exercise self-restraint and take the initiative to reduce leverage manipulation by establishing an appropriate governance structure and sustainable business operation system that incorporate environmental and social governance in addition to general governance.

Policymakers and regulators should formulate unified guidelines with comprehensive criteria to improve the scope and quality of ESG information disclosure and provide specific guidance on ESG practice for firms. Investors should incorporate ESG ratings into their investment decision framework to lower their portfolio risk.

This study contributes to the literature in four ways. Firstly, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, it is among the first to show that high ESG ratings may mitigate firms’ opportunistic behaviours. Secondly, it identifies the governance factor of leverage manipulation from the perspective of firms’ subjective sustainability orientation. Thirdly, it demonstrates that the relationship between ESG ratings and leverage manipulation varies with the level of internal and external supervision. Finally, it highlights the importance of governance in guaranteeing the other two dimensions’ roles by decomposing overall ESG.

To achieve sustainable development objectives, managers are encouraged to implement best practices in corporate social and environmental responsibility within their establishments. The main objective of this chapter is to assess the quality of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) communication for Moroccan financial institutions. This chapter is devoted to the content analysis of the annual reports of 14 financial institutions listed in Morocco regarding ESG strategies between 2017 and 2021. The reference assessment tool we used is the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) standards (2016), based on six principles. Each principle contains requirements and guidance on how to apply it. These principles are summarized in the following: Accuracy, Balance, Clarity, Comparability, Reliability, and Timeliness. The sample is composed of 14 financial institutions listed on the Casablanca Stock Exchange. After checking the content of the annual reports of listed Moroccan financial institutions, we detected several shortcomings in Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) reporting behavior. Companies avoid disclosing information about negative events and performance. We saw this as a bad sign for stakeholders. The results showed a significant gap between the GRI standards and the content of the annual reports. These weaknesses mainly concern accuracy, comparability, and, timeliness, hence the need to carry out corrective measures to improve the quality of ESG practices within Moroccan financial institutions. One of the limitations of this research is its focus on financial institutions. However, it is possible to broaden the scope of the research by assessing the quality of ESG communication for nonfinancial companies.

Prior research on meeting or beating earnings thresholds documents that firms with earnings momentum are awarded with valuation premiums. However, it is unclear from this strand of literature why this is the case. Therefore, this study aims to investigate the effects of time-varying earnings persistence on earnings momentum and their pricing effects.

This study exploits a firm that reports earnings momentum as research setting to examine whether earnings persistence is significantly higher for firms with consecutive earnings increases. In addition, it investigates a relation between earnings momentum and fundamentals-driven earnings persistence and estimates return associations of earnings momentum conditional on economic-based persistence of earnings.

The empirical evidence suggests that firms with earnings momentum reflect higher time-varying earnings persistence. It further reveals that longer duration of earnings momentum is associated with higher fundamentals-driven earnings persistence. More importantly, valuation premiums are exclusively assigned to earnings momentum determined by strong firm fundamentals, not momentum itself.

This study provides new empirical evidence that valuation premiums accrued to firms with earnings momentum are conditional on time-varying earnings persistence. The research implications are relevant to investors, regulators and auditors, as the results bring conclusions that earnings momentum reflects successful business models not poor accounting quality. This leads to a more complete view of earnings momentum and helps allocate resources when evaluating earnings-momentum firms.

The purpose of this study is to examine and identify the predominant themes in the literature on economic freedom. The paper also highlights the key journals, leading authors, top countries and organisations in the literature on economic freedom.

This paper uses the Scopus database to examine 1,512 articles covering the disciplines of economics, finance, business and social sciences from 1942 to 2022. Vosviewer software is used for creating bibliometric networks.

The findings suggest that significant growth in the economic freedom literature has occurred in the last ten years. Considerable attention has been devoted to examining the relationship between economic freedom and growth. The paper also finds that most of the research on economic freedom has been undertaken in the context of developed countries.

This study is one of the first attempts to undertake a bibliometric analysis of economic freedom. The article also highlights the less-researched areas in the literature and thus provides directions for future research.

The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/IJSE-09-2023-0690.

We conducted a systematic review to explore the potential for the application of blockchain technologies for supply chain resilience in a small-scale agri-food business context.

As part of the research methodology, scientific databases such as Web of Science, Google Scholar and Scopus were used to find relevant articles for this review.

The systematic review of articles (n = 57) found that the use of blockchain technology in the small-scale agri-food business sector can reduce the risk of food fraud by assuring the provenance of food products.

Only a few papers were directly from a small-scale agribusiness context. Key challenges that limit the implementation of blockchain and other distributed ledger technologies include concerns over the disclosure of proprietary information and trade secrets, incomplete or inaccurate information, economic and technical difficulties, low levels of trust in the technology, risk of human error and poor governance of process-related issues.

The application of blockchain technology ensures that the risks and costs associated with non-compliance, product recalls and product loss are reduced. Improved communication and information sharing can increase resilience and better support provenance claims and traceability. Better customer relationships can be built, increasing supply chain efficiency and resilience.