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The purpose of this paper is to examine the factors explaining voluntary occupational health and safety disclosures (OHSDs).

Annual report disclosures of 223 Indonesia Stock Exchange listed companies for the year ending 2007 are analyzed. The OHSD components of the 2006 Global Reporting Initiative guidelines are used as the disclosure index checklist.

The results show that approximately 30 percent of Indonesian listed companies provide OHSD. The most disclosed item is health and safety programs. Logistical regression analysis reveals that industry type and international operations significantly influence the propensity to provide OHSD. These findings suggest that coercive isomorphism partially explains OHSD practices in Indonesia.

The main implications of the findings are that Indonesian listed companies generally have poor health and safety information disclosure sets and largely ignore the potential roles of their workers in any health and safety committees.

This paper provides insights into the disclosure practices of occupational health and safety issues, a vital subset of corporate social responsibility disclosure which is still under-researched. The paper also empirically investigates the key determinants of OHSD, an empirical test which is largely ignored in past OHSD-related studies.

Non‐response bias is rarely explored in business research utilising annual reports. Such studies may reach incorrect conclusions in instances where there are systematic differences between companies who respond and those who do not. A global study into airline accounting practices by Tan, Tower, Hancock and Taplin (2002) enabled examination of this important research issue because a database provided an independent source of annual reports. The results indicate minimal response bias in a sample of annual reports obtained from a mail request. Publically listed airline companies that did not respond to a request for their annual report tended to use accounting methods that are considered least favourable by the industry. Therefore, caution needs to be exercised and the assumption that non‐respondents' accounting policy choices are aligned with those of respondents should be tested. Increased availability of annual reports on the internet also raises questions of possible database bias.

A cross‐cultural model of international accounting compatibility is offered by blending Perera's (1989) cultural schema with other dynamic theories. Rahman's (1990) explanatory variables of the accounting regulator and the profession are included along with costly contracting theories (Watts and Zimmerman, 1990) regarding management's behaviour. These latter perspectives help explain the dynamic changes in the external environment. An application of the resulting cross‐cultural model follows through an examination of the potential accounting impact of the emerging free trade zone between New Zealand and Australia. The ability of the tuo national systems to harmonise is suggested by similarities in the environmental factors identified by the extended model. Differences in the regulatory approach between New Zealand and Australia are shown to be supported by underlying cultural factors and may be a persistent barrier. Recent initiatives are les sening this gap. The implications for the New Zealand Society of Accountants' ability to retain control over the standard setting process in New Zealand are also considered.

This paper examines accounting harmonisation and determinants explaining accounting measurement policy choice decisions by Asia‐Pacific listed manufacturing companies. Using Thomas' (1991) theoretical framework, four contingent variables (country of reporting, company size, profitability and debt leverage) are examined as possible determinants of firms' accounting choices concerning non‐current asset valuation measurement base, goodwill and depreciation. 130 listed manufacturing companies' annual reports were examined from Australia, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore. This study involves two phases. The first phase evaluates accounting harmonisation measurement indices in comparison with the extant literature. An important innovation is the operationalisation of Archer et. al. (1995) between‐country and within‐country C indices. Computed comparability indices indicated variations in the level of harmony across the five countries for all three accounting measurement practices. The second phase employed logistic regression to examine possible determinants of accounting policy choice decisions. Such a combined research approach should lead to a better understanding of de facto accounting harmonisation and practices.

Three reporting models — Traditional, Western‐narrow and Western‐broad — are scrutinised to delineate the basis of accounting practices for the Pacific Island Countries' (PIC) entities for the years ending 1997–1999. Evidence is obtained about the filing of reports; timeliness of reports; and disclosure patterns. Patterns are measured via examination of twenty Aggregated Accounting Disclosures (AAD) items and sub‐indices. A significant number of entities completely fail to generate annual reports, or are several years behind the reporting cycle or are unwilling to disseminate their reports. The reporting patterns for PIC entities showed an overall AAD disclosure trend of 52% with specific patterns being 76% of Core Statement Accounting (CSA), 42% Financial Related Accounting (FRA) and 40% Non‐financial Related Accounting (NRA) over the three years. The lack of current annual reports and timely reports (at least 50%) fits much more with the Traditional model than with either Western model.

A positivist empirical study approach is employed using descriptive statistics and inferential statistics based on survey, website and archival data. The study measures the research performance of 573 Australian academic staff in the accounting discipline to explain what current accounting research activities are in Australian universities and why differences exist.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a comparative analysis of the communication of the five major categories of risk (business, strategy, market and credit risk disclosure) over the volatile 2007-2009 global financial crisis (GFC) time period between Indonesia and Malaysia manufacturing listed companies.

A total of 300 firm years data are collected consisting of a random sample of 100 manufacturing listed companies’ annual reports for fiscal year-ends from 2007 to 2009. The reports include 50 annual reports of manufacturing companies per country, listed in the stock exchanges of Indonesia and Malaysia for this three-year GFC time period. This research adopts a researcher-constructed risk disclosure index (RDI) to create an index measuring the extent of risk disclosure by listed firms.

Key findings from statistical analysis are that country of incorporation and size help predict risk disclosure levels. Malaysian companies have significantly higher levels of business risk in 2007 and operating risk communication in 2007, 2008 and 2009 than Indonesian companies. These two countries have similar economic scenarios as developing countries which often have higher “business” risk for companies, but Malaysian companies disclose more risk information than Indonesia. The overall low disclosure levels (27.46-32.92 per cent for Indonesian companies and 35.20-39.04 per cent for Malaysian companies) highlight the potential for far higher communication of key risk factors in these two countries.

This study is important as it contributes to the literature by providing comparative insights into the voluntary risk disclosure practices of manufacturing companies in the two important Asian countries (Indonesia and Malaysia) over the GFC time period. There is lack of risk disclosure studies in manufacturing companies, especially in these two sample countries.

This paper reports the results of a study on the half‐yearly reporting compliance practices of Australian and Singapore listed companies. The possible influence of four contingent variables (country of origin, industry, company size and debt leverage) upon compliance practices is considered. In relation to the issue of half‐yearly reporting, a theoretical framework developed by Thomas (1991) is utilised by linking the variables examined to compliance practices adopted. 186 half‐yearly reports were examined for this study in the 1995/6 fiscal year from Australia and Singapore. The degree of compliance was measured using a compliance index. A series of statistical tools, namely analysis of variance (ANOVA), independent sample t‐test, logistic and multiple regressions, were used to analyse the data collected. Tests conducted to examine whether there was a significant country‐effect upon compliance practices adopted found overwhelming evidence to conclude that Singaporean companies' compliance was significantly higher than their Australian counterparts.

The study analyses de jure disclosure harmony between Australia and Singapore by examining selected disclosure requirements from the statutes, stock exchange listing rules and five accounting standards. Empirical evidence as to Australian and Singaporean companies' de facto disclosure is provided. Two disclosure indices, specifically the no‐violation‐for‐non‐disclosure (NVND) index and the violation‐for‐non‐disclosure (VND), were used to assess the extent of company's disclosure of the selected requirements contained within their respective country's rules.

The purpose of this paper is to examine voluntary risk disclosures within annual reports in four key South‐East Asian countries' (Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, and Australia) manufacturing listed companies over the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) 2007‐2009 financial years.

Longitudinal and cross‐country analyses test the veracity of agency theory to predict the level of firms' risk disclosures. A comprehensive risk disclosure index (RDI) checklist is created with key predictor variables (country, company size, managerial ownership and board independence) tested to explain the dissemination of CSR information over time.

The findings show that the communication of risk data stays relatively consistent (26‐29 per cent across the three GFC “crisis” years). This is arguably a low level of communication from a social responsibility corporate lens. Multiple regression analysis provides evidence that country, size and board independence are positively significantly associated and leverage is negatively significantly associated with the extent of voluntary risk disclosure. Interestingly, Indonesia, the least developed country with arguably the highest business risk factors, consistently has statistically lower levels of risk disclosure compared with their three neighbours.

The sample frame is selected from the stock exchange population of manufacturing companies in key South‐East Asian countries. However, for complete generalization the findings should be tested in other countries and other industries.

The study findings are useful for firm self‐evaluation and benchmarking of risk communication by other corporations across countries.

The study shows relatively low levels of risk disclosure over the GFC crisis time period. Communication of these items are influenced by key firm characteristics and economic drivers. Arguably, higher risk disclosure leads to better understanding of a company's social responsibility stance.

This is a critically important time span to investigate risk disclosures as it encompasses those years most directly impacted by the global financial crisis (GFC).