Quality disclosure in reporting sustainable communication in public listed companies, Malaysia
Although most companies in Malaysia are starting to communicate its sustainability practices, there is considerable doubt on the quality of indicators disclosed in the Sustainability Reporting. Whether the company communicates it accurately and completely portray its impacts. Disclosing low-quali...
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| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Thesis |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
2018
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/83324/1/FBMK%202018%2096%20-%20ir.pdf |
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| Summary: | Although most companies in Malaysia are starting to communicate its
sustainability practices, there is considerable doubt on the quality of indicators
disclosed in the Sustainability Reporting. Whether the company communicates it
accurately and completely portray its impacts. Disclosing low-quality information
to stakeholders will hinder effective communication in company sustainable
development. Previous studies have found that Sustainability Reporting in
Malaysia is still generally low and has developed at a slower pace compared to
other countries. The purpose of this research is to investigate the quality of
indicators disclosed in Sustainability Reporting among companies from different
industries in Malaysia. The quality of three main indicators under the
sustainability concept which are economic, environmental and social disclosures
reported by companies are studied. This research investigates the quality of
economic indicators, environmental indicators and social indicators disclosed in
Sustainability Reports based on the industries which the companies belong.
Sustainability Reports of Top 30 public listed companies in Malaysia are studied.
To achieve the said purposes, observations on companies Sustainability Report
are conducted using a content analysis research method. This method allows the
researcher to observe and evaluate Sustainability Reports of the companies
using the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) framework as a guideline. Data
analysis by univariate analysis and descriptive analysis such as frequencies are
reported. The result shows that the quality of sustainable indicators disclosed by
Top 30 Public listed companies in Malaysia is relatively low. Among the three
performance indicators, the economic dimension has the highest quality
indicators disclosed by company followed by environmental dimension and lastly
social dimension. This study revealed that companies focus more on economic
dimension when reporting Sustainability as a group of stakeholders such as
investor and shareholders that usually interested in this topic hold more power,
legitimacy, and urgency in the continuity of company business. The quality of economic indicators disclosed in the Sustainability Report of
companies among different industries shows that the telecommunication
industry disclosed the most quality indicators compared to others.
Telecommunication industry also disclosed better social indicators than other
industry. It shows that different industry has its own focus when communicating
sustainability in line with their communication objective. Meanwhile, in the
environmental aspect, manufacturing, and real estate industry disclosed the most
quality indicators. As companies operate in a high-risk industry, they tend to
disclose more information to communicate their practices in order to gain
confidence and stay legitimate in front of society. This study further concludes
that even though all of the companies disclosed its sustainability indicators, the
quality is far from perfect. Most of the indicators disclosed are in favor of the
company and mostly communicate on the achievement and contribution of the
companies. It can be seen that the majority of the companies listed on Bursa
Malaysia are not yet ready to communicate a quality sustainable communication
with their stakeholders although it is very important in managing stakeholders’
expectation. This current study contributes to the body of knowledge in the field of
corporate sustainability by integrating sustainable communication and
stakeholders management models in the Malaysian setting. This study
emphasized that company practices sustainable performance to manage
stakeholders’ relation and obtain legitimacy. The findings provide input to
regulatory bodies especially the government on the quality of indicators disclose
on the Sustainability Reports by listed companies in Malaysia. |
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