The Relations among Corporate Environmental Disclosures, Public Initiatives, and Corporate Characteristics: Korean Evidence

This study investigates the relations among corporate environmental disclosure by annual reports and/or stand alone environmental reports, firm characteristics, and public initiatives over the 7 years subsequent to the financial crisis in Korea. Two research questions addressed by this study include (1) Did the aftermath of financial crisis have an impact on environmental disclosure practice in Korea? (2) What are the more influential motivators of Korean corporate environmental disclosure practices? The results of the analyses are summarized as follows. (1) The sample proportion of firms disclosing in footnotes of annual reports remained below 40% over the entire period and the number of firms preparing separate environmental reports was on the rise. (2) The quality of the disclosures remained at low level, which was higher for firms preparing environmental reports relative to non-preparers. (3) Corporate size and industry profile emerged as the most influential motivators behind corporate environmental disclosure decisions, whereas the role played by profitability was less unambiguous. (4) The positive associations between disclosures and firm characteristics, annual report and environmental report disclosures, and public initiatives and firm characteristics did not change even after re-estimating individual relations jointly using simultaneous equation approach.