...Financial Performance and sustainability efforts Name Institutional Affiliation Financial Performance and sustainability efforts Businesses are usually in business to make profits. The management takes a lot of time to evaluate the market and also the potential of the firm. The goals and objectives of most businesses are aimed at maximizing the profits they are currently getting. Some of the ways that have been used in the maximization of profits are increasing the products prices, getting cheaper labour and raw materials, and purchasing better machines for the organization. Increasing the prices of the products sometimes results in success but in most times it leads to low sales as the customers go for the substitutes which are much cheaper and affordable. Having cheap labour and raw materials is not always possible. As much as the business would like to improve its financial performance, measures taken should have a positive effect on the people and the environment. Profits are obtained from the subtracting the total input from the total sales. The sustainability of the business highly depends on the profits being made. The financial performance is not only important to the firm, but also to the shareholders and the investors. When a business has high returns, the shareholders get a higher share, and it also attracts the investors. Most business concentrates more in increasing the profits and just ignore their social responsibilities. A business that...
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...new framework for implementing corporate sustainability Key points: ▪ Sustainability performance is the effect of corporate activity on the social, environmental, and economic fabric of society. ▪ A balance between economic progress, social responsibility, and environmental protection, sometimes referred to as the triple bottom line, can lead to competitive advantage. ▪ The evaluation of social, economic, and environmental impacts of organizational actions is necessary to make effective operational and capital investment decisions that positively impact organizational objectives and satisfy the objectives of multiple stakeholders. ▪ The financial payoff of a proactive sustainability strategy can be substantial. ▪ To become a leader in sustainability, one needs to articulate what sustainability is, develop processes to promote sustainability throughout the corporation, measure performance on sustainability, and ultimately link this measurement to corporate financial performance. ▪ Corporate citizenship is an important driver for building trust, attracting and retaining employees, and obtaining a “license to operate” within a community. ▪ Corporate citizenship is much more than charitable donations and public relations—it’s the way the company integrates sustainability principles with everyday business operations and policies and then translates all of this into bottom-line results. ▪ For sustainability to be long lasting and useful, it must...
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...new framework for implementing corporate sustainability Key points: ▪ Sustainability performance is the effect of corporate activity on the social, environmental, and economic fabric of society. ▪ A balance between economic progress, social responsibility, and environmental protection, sometimes referred to as the triple bottom line, can lead to competitive advantage. ▪ The evaluation of social, economic, and environmental impacts of organizational actions is necessary to make effective operational and capital investment decisions that positively impact organizational objectives and satisfy the objectives of multiple stakeholders. ▪ The financial payoff of a proactive sustainability strategy can be substantial. ▪ To become a leader in sustainability, one needs to articulate what sustainability is, develop processes to promote sustainability throughout the corporation, measure performance on sustainability, and ultimately link this measurement to corporate financial performance. ▪ Corporate citizenship is an important driver for building trust, attracting and retaining employees, and obtaining a “license to operate” within a community. ▪ Corporate citizenship is much more than charitable donations and public relations—it’s the way the company integrates sustainability principles with everyday business operations and policies and then translates all of this into bottom-line results. ▪ For sustainability to be long lasting and useful, it must...
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...The Way Ahead For Sustainability Reporting Written by: Josiah Chia U1010011K Seminar Group 3 Team 1 Name of Instructor: Patricia Tan In recent years, the subject of sustainability reporting is becoming an increasingly contentious topic all around the world, with companies beginning to see the value of adhering to this new and holistic facet of reporting corporate performance. Why is sustainability reporting assuming greater significance in today’s society? To what extent will these developments impact investors and other stakeholders? To fully understand the implications of sustainability reporting on reinventing the way companies disclose their performance, let us first explore its definition as well as its significance. Sustainability Reporting: Definition and Significance In essence, sustainability reporting entails “the publication of environmental, social and governance (ESG) information in a comprehensive and strategic manner that reflects the activities and outcomes across these three dimensions of a company’s performance” (SGX Sustainability Reporting Guide, 2011). It seeks to improve the information content of financial reporting by supplementing that with non-financial information disclosed by the company. With the encouraged extension of companies’ reporting through disclosure of its ESG information, it is hoped that this will provide a more comprehensive and balanced view of a company’s performance. Sustainability reporting assumes greater significance...
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... 2 2. Motivating factors for companies to publish sustainability reports 2 3. Key features of effective sustainability reports 3 3.1 General standard disclosures 3 3.2 Specific standard disclosures 3 3.3 Sector specific disclosures 4 4. The evaluation of Westpac’s sustainability report 4 4.1 General standard disclosures 4 4.2 Specific standard disclosures 5 4.3 Sector specific disclosures 5 5. Conclusion 5 6. Reference 6 Executive Summary This article is going to explain the reason for companies to present their sustainability behaviors and highlight the key feature of an effective sustainability report. Sustainability reports refer to disclose companies’ social and environmental performance. It is essential for the financial service industry to convey their sustainability profile and integrate this to their financial report. This article also makes an evaluation about Westpac’s sustainability report. Westpac’s sustainable reporting has used the table and bar chart to illustrate their sustainability performance accurate and transparent. Therefore, this report has a good quality. 1. Introduction...
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... • Introduction 1 • Reasons for sustainability report 1 • Key features of mining and metal sustainability report 3 • Evaluation of Onesteel’s sustainability report 5 • Conclusion 6 • Recommendation 6 • Reference 8 Executive summary The purpose of this paper was to explain the reasons for which companies started to produce non-financial report and figure out the key features of sustainability report, and then evaluate the sustainability report of Onesteel in relation of the key features. This essay is based on academic journals and professional business websites, as well as information sourced from company’s sustainability report for the year of 2011. The paper discussed the key features of sustainability report mainly by the global reporting initiative sustainability reporting guidelines, such as the six principles (balance, comparability, accuracy, timeliness, clarity and reliability) and the core indicators (environmental factors, human rights, labor practices and decent work, society, product responsibility and economic factors). In conclusion, the company of Onesteel is a leading one of mining industry, it had done well in sustainability report according to the key features of sustainability report. However, Onesteel should include the information about opportunities and predictions for future in order to make the sustainability report more completed, besides this, Onesteel should...
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...Implementing a Sustainability Balanced Scorecard „Dashboard‟ Approach to Assess Organisational Legitimacy. Kevin Huang, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, New South Wale Matthew Pepper, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, New South Wale Graham Bowrey, University of Wollongong, Wollongong, New South Wales gbowrey@uow.edu.au Abstract Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to identify and determine the contributing factors which influence the contents of a firm‟s sustainability reporting through combined social and environmental accounting and management perspectives. Design/methodology/approach: This paper analyzes the disclosed sustainability indicators of a major Australian financial institution, Westpac, through the application of the research method content analysis. The theoretical framework will be shaped by the consideration of legitimacy theory and the Balanced Scorecard approach. Findings: The results indicate that the four perspectives of a traditional Balanced Scorecard are related to the main sources of influential inputs to Westpac‟s sustainability reporting – existing frameworks, stakeholder engagement mechanism, employee involvement and traditional shareholders‟ financial information needs. It also reinforced the argument that the focus of organisational legitimacy is a key resource of organisation survival. Originality/value: This research contributes to the literature on social and environmental disclosures including the research of Do, Tilt and Tilling...
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...Atatürk Üniversitesi İktisadi ve İdari Bilimler Dergisi, Cilt: 28, Sayı: 3, 2014 189 INVESTIGATING THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY AND FINANCIAL PERFORMANCE IN TURKEY Funda ÖZÇELİK Burcu AVCI ÖZTÜRK Sevda GÜRSAKAL Abstract: This paper examined the relationship between corporate social responsibility and firm financial performance in Borsa Istanbul 100 index companies between the years 2010 and 2012. In order to test our hypothesis that the companies issuing corporate social responsibility reports have higher performance in terms of financial accounting ratios, we applied a logistic regression analysis. Corporate social responsibility was used as the dependent variable and financial performance measures, firm size, firm risk, and type of ownership as independent variables. We found that there was a significant relationship between company size and corporate social responsibility. We were not able to find any significant relationship between financial performance, risk, type of ownership and corporate social responsibility. Key Words: Corporate Social Responsibility, Sustainability Reporting, Financial Performance TÜRKİYE’DE KURUMSAL SOSYAL SORUMLULUK VE FİNANSAL PERFORMANS ARASINDAKİ İLİŞKİNİN ARAŞTIRILMASI Özet: Bu çalışmada, kurumsal sosyal sorumluluk ile finansal performans arasındaki ilişki Borsa İstanbul 100 endeksinde yeralan şirketlerin 2010-2012 yılları arasındaki verileri esas alınarak incelenmiştir. Kurumsal sosyal sorumluluk raporu...
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...Sustainability Reporting Sustainability means different things to different people; therefore, a universal definition of sustainability is elusive. The most often quoted definition is from the Brundtland Commission (1987), which states that sustainable development is “Development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” Sustainability is, therefore, more of a journey than a destination wherein ideals, values and measurement metrics are in a constant state of evolution. The quest for sustainable development started with environmental concerns, and climate change has now become one of the biggest developmental challenges. As the Brundtland Commission had discovered...
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...publishing sustainability report 1 3. Key features of sustainability report 2 3.1 Completeness 2 3.2 Transparency 2 3.3 Comparability 2 4. Evaluation 3 4.1 Completeness 3 4.2 Transparency 3 4.3 Comparability 3 5. Conclusion 4 6. References 5 Executive summary Sustainability report is a kind of report which results from sustainable development, it aims at helping company to have a better long-term performance. Sustainability report is characterized by a range of information include environmental, social and governance. Sustainability report has a great impact on investment decision and company's financial performance. The motivation of company publish the sustainability report is the benefits which include more profit, reputation, and support from government and consumer. The key features of the sustainability report contain completeness, transparency and comparability. 1 Introduction With the growing demand for meaningful, timely and comparable data, sustainability report becomes more and more popular; almost every company will publish their sustainability report. Thus, stakeholders put more attention on the quality of sustainability report. This report will not only describe the motivation of company publish the sustainability report and...
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...Financial Performance and sustainability efforts Name Institutional Affiliation Financial Performance and sustainability efforts Business are usually in business to make profits. The management takes a lot of time to evaluate the market and also the potential of the firm. The goals and objectives of most businesses are aimed at maximizing the profits they are currently getting. Some of the ways that have been used in the maximization of profits are increasing the products prices, getting cheaper labour and raw materials, and purchasing better machines for the organization. Increasing the prices of the products sometimes results in success but in most times it leads to low sales as the customers go for the substitutes which are much cheaper and affordable. Having cheap labour and raw materials is not always possible. As much as the business would like to improve its financial performance, measures taken should have a positive effect on the people and the environment. Profits are obtained from the subtracting the total input from the total sales. The sustainability of the business highly depends on the profits being made. The financial performance is not only important to the firm, but also to the shareholders and the investors. When a business has high returns, the shareholders get a higher share, and it also attracts the investors. Most business concentrates more in increasing the profits and just ignore their social responsibilities. A business that engages...
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...The Co-operative Group Sustainability Report 2010 Executive summary 11 Social responsibility Ecological sustainability Delivering value Assurance SuSTainabiliTy manaGEmEnT background Sustainability management and reporting is aligned with the three principles of the AA1000 AccountAbility Principles Standard (2008) 1 : materiality, inclusivity and responsiveness. Members are firmly embedded in governance (both in general, and in sustainability governance specifically) and policy formulation (pages 13 and 14). As such, whilst engagement with wider stakeholders is central, there is an additional focus on how democratic structures are used to ensure that strategies, policies and performance respond to stakeholder concerns. This level of responsiveness is almost certainly unique among large businesses in the UK. materiality and strategy In 2010, following consultation with different stakeholders, the Group Board agreed a new vision: ‘to build a better society by excelling at everything we do’. In pursuit of this, six aims are identified: to be a commercially successful business; to meet the needs of the customers and communities served; to respond to members and to share profits; to be an ethical leader; to be an exemplary employer; and to inspire others through co-operation. The key performance indicators underpinning strategy, together with progress, are presented within the Annual Report and Accounts 2 . The Sustainable Development...
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...Sustainability reporting is a set of reports to measure and disclosing for fulfil the interest of internal and external stakeholders such as employees, customers, local communities and more to provide insight into corporate sustainability performance through the development of sustainability (Sustainability Reporting Guidelines 2011, 3). It linked to describe reporting on environmental, economic and social impacts in business terms often called the triple bottom line approach. Triple bottom line approach using qualitative and quantitative for the measurement of company performance as well as to attain the goal of sustainable development (Brueckner 2010, 94). Sustainability reporting also called non-financial reporting which illustrate key elements corporate performance such as social reporting, triple bottom line reporting and more (Choudhuri and Chakraborty 2009). Within the sustainability reporting, the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) which include general and sector specific content that has been agreed by variety of stakeholders around the world to generally applicable for reporting corporate sustainability performance (Sustainability Reporting Guidelines 2011, 3). Organization with sustainability will drive the increases of profit. Hence, product and services supply in environmentally friendly and energy-efficient because of the rising of demand by the society. A well corporate sustainability performance may influence the perception of society toward the company (Green...
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...'Club of Economics in Miskolc' TMP Vol. 8., Nr. 2., pp. 23-30. 2012. Green Accounting for Corporate Sustainability BETTINA HÓDI HERNÁDI ASSISTANT LECTURER e-mail: vgtbetti@uni-miskolc.hu SUMMARY Today, corporate sustainability is one of the greatest challenges facing companies. Therefore, this study aims to show how accounting, as the language of business and the source of information, can meet the criteria of sustainability. This article starts out by analysing the different approaches to corporate sustainability, then it proposes the reinterpretation of the most important accounting principle, the ‘going concern’ principle. In the following section it outlines the characteristics of accounting from the point of view of sustainability. Finally, it proposes ways of transforming green accounting, both in name and content, into sustainability accounting. Keywords: corporate sustainability; the ‘going concern’ principle; green accounting (environmental accounting); sustainability accounting Journal of Economic Literature (JEL) code: M41 INTRODUCTION According to the Brundtland Commission (1987, p. 43), “Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of present generations without compromising the similar needs of future generations. The concept interprets sustainable economic, ecological and social development as a unity.” Today’s companies must also comply with the challenges stemming from this approach, and therefore they must also implement economic,...
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...ACCA mAlAysiA sustAinAbility reporting AWArDs (masrA) 2011 2 contents Introduction The age of integration: a new dawn for corporate reporting Panel of judges Entrants Shortlisted reports ACCA MaSRA 2011 winners Judges’ feedback Supporting organisations About ACCA 4 6 11 12 14 17 25 28 31 ACKnoWleDgement ACCA would like to thank and acknowledge the contribution and support of the distinguished panel of judges, AccountAbility, Bursa Malaysia Berhad, CorporateRegister.com, The Department of Environment (DOE), The Edge Business Weekly, The Edge Financial Daily and last but not least all participating companies in the Awards. We believe that the participating companies deserve recognition for leading the way to identify and communicate their environmental and social performance. Companies such as these are contributing towards the advancement of sustainable development and performance. 3 introduction Welcome to the ACCA report of the Judges for the malaysia sustainability reporting Awards (masrA) 2011. ACCA and our supporting partners for the masrA 2011 would like to thank all the companies that participated this year. Since the last ACCA MaSRA, the world of corporate social responsibility and sustainability reporting has been undergoing tremendous change. This is reflected in the various developments on the international and local front. Nationally, Bursa Malaysia remains a key driver of sustainability reporting for corporate Malaysia....
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