Search results

The main objective of the study was to compare Business Responsibility and Sustainability Report (BRSR) norms with Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) standards, so as to establish whether BRSR norms match the global standards and best practices or not. Additionally, an effort was made to ascertain and highlight areas where BRSR norms are more comprehensive, just match, or require further refinement to be at par with the GRI standards. The study highlights the similarities and dissimilarities between the internationally accepted GRI standards and the BRSR framework; thereby suggesting areas of improvement for the BRSR framework.

Scrutinised all the 36 standards of the Global reporting initiative and BRSR format and guidelines of the Securities Exchange Board of India. The Content Analysis Technique was used to ascertain the percentages of similarities between the two frameworks.

The content analysis found that there are 52.30% similarities between BRSR norms and GRI standards. Further, this study shows the factors that led to the dissimilarities between BRSR and GRI standards. This study found 18 areas where BRSR is more informative than GRI, and 7 areas where BRSR could be further refined.

This study contributes to research in the sustainability reporting framework to be adopted by Indian listed companies. There are a few Indian listed companies who are already reporting as per the GRI framework and might perceive the BRSR as a separate reporting altogether. But as found in this study, more than half of the BRSR framework is similar to the GRI framework; thus, half the work is almost done. As such this study helps Indian firms in developing an understanding of the BRSR and puts in perspective its standing among global sustainability reporting standards. This study shall help institutional investors, rating agencies, and external assurers to better visualize an Indian entity, by referring to its Business Responsibility and Sustainability Reporting.

This paper aims to examine whether tax disclosure in Global Reporting Initiative (GRI)-based sustainability reporting mitigates aggressive tax avoidance.

This study uses a multiple regression method for 714 nonspecially taxed firms listed on the Indonesia Stock Exchange in 2014–2018.

The findings demonstrate that disclosing tax payments in GRI-based sustainability reports reduces aggressive tax avoidance. Additional analysis indicates that the number of GRI-based sustainability reports positively affects aggressive tax avoidance. However, disclosing tax payments in multiple GRI-based sustainability reports negatively affects aggressive tax avoidance.

Recent prior studies demonstrate that aggressive tax avoidance does not indicate an organizational culture that devalues corporate social responsibility. This paper argues that firms cannot find the link between tax and corporate social responsibility when tax payments are not incorporated in sustainability reports. GRI considers tax a sustainability issue and seeks to institutionalize this concept by recommending that firms disclose taxes in their sustainability reports. This research analyses whether disclosing taxes in GRI-based sustainability reports may serve as a form of soft law by convincing firms that tax is a sustainability issue, thereby reducing their tax avoidance. This topic has received little attention in previous research.

The main purpose of the Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (DEWA) sustainability case is to allow students to explore how nonfinancial information reported in sustainability plays a vital role in maintaining a trade-off between current economic pressure and future environmental needs.

This is an exploratory study in nature using a qualitative case study approach. The case requires an examination of DEWA's sustainability reporting (SR) in the context of Global Reporting Initiatives (GRIs). This case is designed to assist students in gauging DEWA's sustainability and explore how the company evaluates the materiality of sustainability issues.

With stakeholders' and investors' increased interest in sustainability, the authors argue that accounting programs should incorporate this topic into their curricula. The case enables students to focus on sustainability-related initiatives with DEWA that are aligned with GRI initiatives. The case might be instructive for both undergraduate and postgraduate students studying environmental and management accounting.

This case study is the first of its kind in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) region to comprehensively analyze DEWA's sustainability practices concerning GRI-based SR. This study widens the understanding of DEWA's implementation of GRI standards in the preparation of its sustainability reports.

Integrated reporting enhances the meaningfulness of non-financial information, but whether this enhancement is progressive or regressive from a sustainability perspective is unknown. This study aims to examine the influence of the Integrated Reporting (<IR>) Framework on the disclosure of financial- and impact-material sustainability-related information in integrated reports.

Using a disclosure index constructed from the Global Reporting Initiative’s G4 Guidelines and UN Sustainable Development Goals, the authors content analysed integrated reports of 40 companies from the International Integrated Reporting Council’s Pilot Programme Business Network published between 2015 and 2017. The content analysis distinguished between financial- and impact-material sustainability-related information.

The extent of sustainability-related disclosures in integrated reports remained more or less constant over the study period. Impact-material disclosures were more prominent than financial material ones. Impact-material disclosures mainly related to environmental aspects, while labour practices-related disclosures were predominantly financially material. The balance between financially- and impact-material sustainability-related disclosures varied based on factors such as industry environmental sensitivity and country-specific characteristics, such as the country’s legal system and development status.

The paper presents a unique disclosure index to distinguish between financially- and impact-material sustainability-related disclosures. Researchers can use this disclosure index to critically examine the nature of sustainability-related disclosure in corporate reports.

This study offers an in-depth understanding of the influence of non-financial reporting frameworks, such as the <IR> Framework that uses a financial materiality perspective, on sustainability reporting. The findings reveal that the practical implementation of the <IR> Framework resulted in sustainability reporting outcomes that deviated from theoretical expectations. Exploring the materiality concept that underscores sustainability-related disclosures by companies using the <IR> Framework is useful for predicting the effects of adopting the Sustainability Disclosure Standards issued by the International Sustainability Standards Board, which also emphasises financial materiality.

Despite an emphasis on financial materiality in the <IR> Framework, companies continue to offer substantial impact-material information, implying the potential for companies to balance both financial and broader societal concerns in their reporting.

While prior research has delved into the practices of regulated integrated reporting, especially in the unique context of South Africa, this study focuses on voluntary adoption, attributing observed practices to intrinsic company motivations. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, it is the first study to explicitly explore the nature of materiality in sustainability-related disclosure. The research also introduces a nuanced understanding of contextual factors influencing sustainability reporting.

The Agenda 2030 have drawn a lot of interest in academic studies. This necessitates accounting research on nonfinancial reporting and sustainable development goals (SDG) disclosure in an under-investigated context. The purpose of this study is to examine the contribution of nonfinancial reporting practices to SDG disclosure by 120 companies from 12 African nations for the years 2016 to 2020.

The study uses a content analysis to gauge how much information are disclosed on SDG by the selected firms. The authors carried out content analysis using the global reporting initiative frameworks to determine the level of SDG disclosure across the companies by examining the selected nonfinancial reports.

Sustainability reports account for 50% of such SDG disclosure making it the highest. This is followed by corporate social responsibility report which accounts for 23%, while environmental reports account for 20% and Chairman’s statement accounts for 7%. The result is expected since corporate sustainability report has been the major channel for disclosing activities relating to social and governance issues in recent times.

The results of this study demand that corporate entities in Africa take responsibility for their actions and exert significant effort to achieve the SDG. While the government has the main responsibility, corporate entities must support the SDG to be realized.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is one of the few studies that examines nonfinancial reporting practices with a focus on SDG disclosure. In addition, this study offers novel insight into how accounting research contributes to nonfinancial reporting practices and SDG disclosure.

This study investigates CSR reporting’s role in debt access and cost of debt with the moderating role of external assurance and GRI adoption in emerging markets. Such an investigation will help facilitate external fund flow to firms in better terms.

We collected data from 16 emerging markets between 2008 and 2019 from the Thomson Reuters Eikon and ran fixed effects regression analysis and robustness tests by addressing endogeneity concerns, adopting alternative sample and integrating additional control variables.

The results show that CSR reporting has a positive association with access to debt and a negative association with the cost of debt. Furthermore, both external assurance and GRI adoption do not significantly moderate between CSR reporting and access to debt and cost of debt. Hence, creditors in emerging markets are not interested in CSR report assurance and GRI framework adoption and do not integrate them into their lending decisions.

Emerging markets are unique settings characterized by high growth rates, limited capital availability, high debt costs and weak institutional environments. Thus, reaching debt with convenient conditions is critical for emerging market firms to finance their growth. Hence, our study will help emerging market firms reach external funding more easily and in better terms via CSR transparency. Besides, our investigation is based on a broad sample of emerging markets, and hence updates prior emerging market studies conducted in single-country settings. Lastly, we test the complementarity of third-party assurance and GRI adoption to CSR reporting in loan contracting.

This study aims to investigate the equity market reaction to sustainability disclosure measures derived from firms' inaugural sustainability reports following the implementation of mandatory sustainability reporting in Singapore.

This study explores the equity market reaction to first-time sustainability reports of mandatory adopters and compares the reactions between voluntary and mandatory adopters. To mitigate any imbalanced distribution effects, entropy balancing techniques are employed.

The author observes a significant equity market reaction when mandatory adopters adhere to a reporting framework and release sustainability reports as standalone documents. Additionally, the study indicates that government regulation amplifies the equity market reaction for companies that include a board statement within their sustainability reports and present them as standalone publications.

The lack of quantitative information disclosed in the first-time sustainability reports may restrict the generalizability of the findings.

The findings provide valuable insights for organizations and managers to evaluate the market's response to sustainability disclosures and improve communication effectiveness with investors. Furthermore, the study has direct policy implications for global standard-setting organizations in sustainability reporting. The findings support the notion that investors value market-led and investor-focused sustainability disclosures.

The study contributes to the limited body of research that examines the capital market effects of mandatory sustainability disclosures. To the author’s knowledge, this is among a few studies to directly investigate the equity market reaction to mandatory sustainability disclosures at the firm level.

The lack of transparency contributes to the growing corruption problem in various spheres of society. This paper aims to analyse the sustainability report disclosures published by Czech companies in 2021 and registered by the Association of Social Sustainability of the Czech Republic.

Based on three hypotheses, the relationships between the level of disclosed anti-corruption information and selected variables related to the corporate environment are tested using content analysis and the Mann–Whitney test.

This paper reveals that Czech firms provide more information if they operate in a higher-risk environment (energy, materials and financial services) or are state-owned (or with a state ownership stake). It also reveals that companies participating in corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives (UN Global Compact and Global Reporting Initiative) increase their credibility and social responsibility with more disclosed information.

A limitation of this paper is the smaller number of selected companies matching the chosen criteria. In addition, a certain degree of subjectivity is likely to have manifested in the process of coding the reports and in the use of the content analysis method.

The paper contributes to research that addresses the fight against corruption and CSR issues with a specific study in a small, Central European country and provides new empirical data on the anti-corruption fight problem.

The purpose of this paper is to explore how effectively leading sustainable hotels have integrated Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) into their reporting. The main aim is to pinpoint areas for improvement concerning SDG reporting which can help the hospitality industry to achieve a transformation in a more SDG-aligned global tourism system.

For this study, a content analysis technique was used to extract the information regarding strategic consistency of SDG reporting. Both qualitative and quantitative approaches were applied to the analysis of this information. This paper seeks to assess the extent to which the materiality analysis, corporate targets and performance indicators defined by the world’s top sustainable hotels in their sustainability reports are consistent with those SDGs linked to the business. To that end, the authors have selected the most sustainable hotels according to the SAM Corporate Sustainability Assessment in 2020.

The results of this study show that the most sustainable hotel companies did not take a strategic consistency approach when reporting the SDGs. These findings identify four areas for improvement concerning reporting, which may promote the adoption of a strategic and consistent approach in SDG reporting.

This study includes a set of recommendations to provide the market with complete, coherent and comparable information on their contribution to the SDGs and, therefore, foster collective learning to bring about sustainable tourism transformation.

This paper represents a contribution to the discussion on the strategic or symbolic implementation of SDGs at a corporate level. In addition, this paper reflects a deeper understanding of how hotel companies could improve their reporting and management system to contribute to SDGs.

Growing concern over sustainability adoption has presented an array of challenges to businesses. While vital to an economy's success, banking is not immune to societal, environmental and economic consequences of business practices. The study has examined the sustainable performance of banking institutions on the suggested multidimensional framework comprising economic, environmental, social, governance and financial dimensions and 52 sustainability indicators. The study benchmarks the significant performance indicators of leading banks indispensable to sustainable banking performance. The findings attempt to address research questions concerning the extent of sustainable banking performance, ranking the sustainability dimensions and indicators and standardizing sustainability adoption metrics.

To determine the responsiveness of the banking industry to sustainability dimensions, content analysis was conducted using NVivo software for the year 2021–2022. Furthermore, a hybrid multicriteria decision-making (MCDM) approach is used by integrating entropy, the technique for order preference by similarity to ideal solution (TOPSIS) and VlseKriterijumska Optimizacija KOmpromisno Resenje (VIKOR) to provide relative weights to performance indicators and prioritize banks based on their sustainable performance. Sensitivity analysis is used to ensure the robustness of results.

In the context of the Indian banking industry, the pattern of sustainability reporting is inconsistent and concentrated on addressing environmental and social concerns. The results of the entropy methodology prioritized “Environmental” sustainability over other selected dimensions while “Financial” dimension has been assigned the least priority in the ranking order. The significant sustainable performance indicators delineated in this study should be used as standards to ensure the accountability and credibility of the sustainable banking industry. Additionally, the research findings will provide valuable inputs to policymakers and regulators to assure better contribution of the banking sector in meeting sustainability goals.

Considering the paucity of studies on sustainable banking performance, this study makes two significant contributions to the literature. First, the suggested multidimensional disclosure model integrating financial and nonfinancial indicators would facilitate banking institutions in addressing the five aspects of sustainability. As one of the first studies in the context of the Indian banking industry, the findings would pave the way for better diffusion of sustainability practices. Second, the inclusion of MCDM techniques prioritizes the significance of sustainability indicators and benchmarks the performance of leading banks to achieve better profits and more substantial growth.