ENVIRONMENTAL DISCLOSURE LEVEL: A FIRMS’ PROACTIVE OR DEFENSIVE POSTURE?

Ribeiro, Maisa de Souza; Santos, Edilene Santana; Fregonesi, Mariana Simões Ferraz do Amaral; Cunha, Lucelma Maria dos Santos

doi:10.1590/S0034-759020220311x

Maisa de Souza Ribeiro

Universidade de São Paulo, Faculdade de Economia, Administração e Contabilidade de Ribeirão Preto, Programa de Pós-Graduação em Controladoria e Contabilidade, Ribeirão Preto, SP, Brazil

https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1165-1813

Edilene Santana Santos

Fundação Getulio Vargas, Escola de Administração de Empresas de São Paulo, São Paulo, SP, Brazil

https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0230-9357

Mariana Simões Ferraz do Amaral Fregonesi

Universidade de São Paulo, Faculdade de Economia, Administração e Contabilidade de Ribeirão Preto, Programa de Pós-Graduação em Controladoria e Contabilidade, Ribeirão Preto, SP, Brazil

https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6704-4196

Lucelma Maria dos Santos Cunha

Universidade de São Paulo, Faculdade de Economia, Administração e Contabilidade de Ribeirão Preto, Programa de Pós-Graduação em Controladoria e Contabilidade, Ribeirão Preto, SP, Brazil

https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4743-604X

AUTHORS’ CONTRIBUTIONS

Maisa de Souza Ribeiro, Edilene Santana Santos e Mariana Simões Ferraz do Amaral Fregonesi worked on the conceptualization and theoretical-methodological approach. The theoretical review was conducted by Maisa de Souza Ribeiro, Edilene Santana Santos e Lucelma Maria dos Santos Cunha. Data collection was coordinated by Maisa de Souza Ribeiro e Lucelma Maria dos Santos Cunha. Data analysis included Mariana Simões Ferraz do Amaral Fregonesi, Edilene Santana Santos e Maisa de Souza Ribeiro. Maisa de Souza Ribeiro, Edilene Santana Santos, Mariana Simões Ferraz do Amaral Fregonesi and Lucelma Maria dos Santos Cunha worked together in the writing and final revision of the manuscript.

Variables	Type	Proxy	Literature	Expected effect	Source of data
Level of environmental disclosure (EDS)	D	Environmental Disclosure Score - EDS	Aragón-Correa et al. (2016); Qiu et al. (2016)Qiu, Y., Shaukat, A., & Tharyan, R. (2016). Environmental and social disclosures: Link with corporate financial performance. The British Accounting Review, 48(1), 102-116. doi: 10.1016/j.bar.2014.10.007 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bar.2014.10.00... ; Bellamy et al. (2020Bellamy, M. A., Dhanorkar, S., & Subramanian, R. (2020). Administrative environmental innovations, supply network structure, and environmental disclosure. Journal of Operations Management, 66(7/8), 895-932. doi: 10.1002/joom.1114 https://doi.org/10.1002/joom.1114... )		Bloomberg
Corporate Sustainability Index (ISE)	I	Dummy assuming “1” for a company i included in the ISE index in year t; and “0” otherwise	Rover et al. (2012)Rover, S., Tomazzia, E. C., Murcia, F. D.-R., & Borba, J. A. (2012). Explicações para a divulgação voluntária ambiental no Brasil utilizando análise de regressão em painel. Revista de Administração, 47(2), 217-230. doi: 10.5700/rausp1035 https://doi.org/10.5700/rausp1035... ; Coelho et al. (2013)Coelho, F. Q., Ott, E., Pires, C. B., & Alves, T. W. (2013). Uma análise dos fatores diferenciadores na divulgação de informações voluntárias sobre o meio ambiente. Contabilidade Vista & Revista, 24(1), 112-130. Recuperado de https://revistas.face.ufmg.br/index.php/contabilidadevistaerevista/article/view/1290 https://revistas.face.ufmg.br/index.php/... ; Lourenço e Branco (2013)Lourenço, I. C., & Branco, M. C. (2013). Determinants of corporate sustainability performance in emerging markets: the Brazilian case. Journal of Cleaner Production, 57, 134-141. doi: 10.1016/j.jclepro.2013.06.013 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2013.0... ; Rosa et al. (2015)Rosa, F. S., Guesser, T., Hein, N., Pfitscher, E. D., & Lunkes, R. J. (2015). Environmental impact management of Brazilian companies: Analyzing factors that influence disclosure of waste, emissions, effluents, and other impacts. Journal of Cleaner Production, 96, 148-160. doi: 10.1016/j.jclepro.2013.10.035 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2013.1... ; Leal et al. (2018Leal, P. H., Costa, B. M. do N., Oliveira, M. C., & Rebouças, S. M. D. P. (2018). Divulgação de provisões e passivos contingentes ambientais sob a ótica da teoria institucional. Enfoque: Reflexão Contábil, 37(3), 37-54. doi: 10.4025/enfoque.v37i3.39477 https://doi.org/10.4025/enfoque.v37i3.39... )	(+)	B3
Presence of environmental provision (DmyPA)⁽¹⁾	I	Dummy assuming “1” for a company i that presented environmental provision in year t; and “0” otherwise	-	(+)	SFSs
Materiality of environmental provision (MatPA)	I	Percentage of how much the total amount of the environmental provision (PA) of a company i in year t represents in relation to the total amount of the company i’s assets in year t	Barth et al. (1997)	(+)	SFSs
EnvSens	I	Dummy assuming “1” for a company i belonging to environmentally sensitive sectors; and “0” otherwise	Deegan e Gordon (1996); Clarkson et al. (2008)Clarkson, P. M., Li, Y., Richardson, G. D., & Vasvari, F. P. (2008). Revisiting the relation between environmental performance and environmental disclosure: An empirical analysis. Accounting, Organizations and Society, 33(4/5), 303-327. doi: 10.1016/j.aos.2007.05.003 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.aos.2007.05.00...	(+)	Bloomberg
Size (Size)	C	Natural logarithm of the net revenue of company i in year t	Cormier et al. (2005); Leal et al. (2018)Leal, P. H., Costa, B. M. do N., Oliveira, M. C., & Rebouças, S. M. D. P. (2018). Divulgação de provisões e passivos contingentes ambientais sob a ótica da teoria institucional. Enfoque: Reflexão Contábil, 37(3), 37-54. doi: 10.4025/enfoque.v37i3.39477 https://doi.org/10.4025/enfoque.v37i3.39... ; McBrayer (2018)McBrayer, G. A. (2018). Does persistence explain ESG disclosure decisions?. Corporate Social Responsibility and Environmental Management, 25(6), 1074-1086. doi: 10.1002/csr.1521 https://doi.org/10.1002/csr.1521...	(+)	Economática
Profitability (Profit)	C	Net margin of company i in year t	Rover et al. (2012)Rover, S., Tomazzia, E. C., Murcia, F. D.-R., & Borba, J. A. (2012). Explicações para a divulgação voluntária ambiental no Brasil utilizando análise de regressão em painel. Revista de Administração, 47(2), 217-230. doi: 10.5700/rausp1035 https://doi.org/10.5700/rausp1035... ; Coelho et al. (2013Coelho, F. Q., Ott, E., Pires, C. B., & Alves, T. W. (2013). Uma análise dos fatores diferenciadores na divulgação de informações voluntárias sobre o meio ambiente. Contabilidade Vista & Revista, 24(1), 112-130. Recuperado de https://revistas.face.ufmg.br/index.php/contabilidadevistaerevista/article/view/1290 https://revistas.face.ufmg.br/index.php/... )	(+)	Economática
Indebtedness (Ind)	C	Debt in relation to the total of debt plus equity of company i in year t [D/(D+E)]	Rover et al. (2012)Rover, S., Tomazzia, E. C., Murcia, F. D.-R., & Borba, J. A. (2012). Explicações para a divulgação voluntária ambiental no Brasil utilizando análise de regressão em painel. Revista de Administração, 47(2), 217-230. doi: 10.5700/rausp1035 https://doi.org/10.5700/rausp1035... ; Lourenço e Branco (2013)Lourenço, I. C., & Branco, M. C. (2013). Determinants of corporate sustainability performance in emerging markets: the Brazilian case. Journal of Cleaner Production, 57, 134-141. doi: 10.1016/j.jclepro.2013.06.013 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2013.0...	(+)	Economática

Variable	Average	Standard deviation	Minimum	Median	Maximum
EDS	32.2190	18.2427	1.5504	31.0078	74.3802
MatPA	0.2752	1.1597	0.0000	0.0000	12.7255
SIZE	15.6113	1.4842	6.0472	15.5989	19.8797
IND	46.9665	31.0996	-39.5179	45.1603	364.7738
PROFIT	43.2178	1075.5070	-6123.1280	7.7274	26177.3800
*Descriptive statistics for Subgroup with EnvSens=0*
EDS	30.2497	18.7996	1.5504	30.2083	71.3178
MatPA	0.0397	0.1594	0.0000	0.0000	1.6412
SIZE	15.4638	1.3795	11.7112	15.5989	19.0505
IND	47.7905	34.7033	0.1114	45.1603	350.3081
PROFIT	6.1536	35.0739	-408.1836	7.4987	166.2098
*Descriptive statistics for Subgroup with EnvSens=1*
EDS	34.8139	17.1652	2.3256	31.7829	74.3802
MatPA	0.5855	1.7083	0.0000	0.0000	12.7255
SIZE	15.8056	1.5930	6.0472	15.6996	19.8797
IND	45.8808	25.5951	-39.5179	45.7543	364.7738
PROFIT	92.0565	1636.8540	-6123.1280	7.9047	26177.3800

	ISE		DmyPA		Total	Average EDS	Average MatPA
	0	1	0	1	Total	Average EDS	Average MatPA
EnvSens = 0	362	99	406	55	461	31.1009	0.0424
EnvSens = 1	241	137	191	187	378	35.0183	0.6094
Total	603	236	597	242	839
Average EDS	26.4365	46.9936	28.0142	42.5920
Average MatPA	0.2452	0.3518	0.0000	0.8589
Mann-Whitney	p-value = 0.0000		p-value = 0.0000			p-value = 0.0004

	EDS	MatPA	Size	Profit	Ind	ISE	EnvSens
EDS	1	1	1	1	1	1	1
MatPA	0.131^* ***** ,	1
Tam	0.424^* ***** ,	0.068^ , and
Rent	0.147^* ***** ,	-0.016	0.057
End	0.105^* ***** ,	-0.185^* ***** ,	0.215^* ***** ,	-0.298^ , and
ISE	0.507^* ***** ,	0.041	0.314^* ***** ,	0.043	0.064
EnvSens	0.156^* ***** ,	0.229^* ***** ,	0.126^* ***** ,	0.01	0	-0.163^* ***** ,
	Point-biserial correlation			Pearson correlation		Phi coefficient

	Dynamic panel data Arellano-Bover/Blundell-Bond
	GMM standard errors			Robust standard errors
Var / Coef.	Expected effect	All companies		EnvSens = 0		EnvSens = 1
EDS lag1	+	0.7002	^* ***** ,	0.8403	^* ***** ,	0.4081	^* ***** ,
ISE	+	2.6147	^* ***** ,	3.4578	^* ***** ,	-0.4263
MatPA	+	0.3375		-1.6137		0.9555	^* * indicate significance at the level of 1%, 5%, and 10%, respectively.
EnvSens	+	3.6325		omitted		omitted
Tam	+	2.1152	^ , and	2.0277	^ , and	0.2522
End	+	0.0486	^ , and	-0.0719	^* ***** ,	-0.0388
Rent	+	0.0011		-0.0016		0.0092
Constante		-26.2952	^ , and	-21.7982	^* * indicate significance at the level of 1%, 5%, and 10%, respectively.	11.4518

Wald chi²		168.4500	^* ***** ,	170.5000	^* ***** ,	30.0100	^* ***** ,
Observações		726		410		316
P-v. Sargan test		0.2595		--		--
P-v. Abond AR (2)		--		0.5796		0.1053

	t<6 was not included				Idem without lagged variable				t: 2015 to 2018 (balanced)				Only ISE=0
	Dynamic data panel				Panel GLS EA				Panel GLS EA - Driscoll-Kraay				Panel GLS EA
	EnvSens = 0		EnvSens = 1		EnvSens = 0		EnvSens = 1		EnvSens = 0		EnvSens = 1		All
Observ	384		302		438		342		216		160		548
ISE	3.3712	^* ***** ,	-0.0483		5.057	^* ***** ,	2.384	^ , and	9.3723	^* ***** ,	5.2721		omitted
MatPA	-1.7134		0.9795	^ , and	-1.059		1.049	^* ***** ,	-1.8134		0.8741	^ , and	0.8648 ^* ***** ,

Wald chi2	184.13	^* ***** ,	59.69	^* ***** ,	65.39	^* ***** ,	24.14	^* ***** ,	1039.0	^* ***** ,	11315.6	^* ***** ,	70.12 ^* ***** ,

[1] AUTHORS’ CONTRIBUTIONS

Maisa de Souza Ribeiro, Edilene Santana Santos e Mariana Simões Ferraz do Amaral Fregonesi worked on the conceptualization and theoretical-methodological approach. The theoretical review was conducted by Maisa de Souza Ribeiro, Edilene Santana Santos e Lucelma Maria dos Santos Cunha. Data collection was coordinated by Maisa de Souza Ribeiro e Lucelma Maria dos Santos Cunha. Data analysis included Mariana Simões Ferraz do Amaral Fregonesi, Edilene Santana Santos e Maisa de Souza Ribeiro. Maisa de Souza Ribeiro, Edilene Santana Santos, Mariana Simões Ferraz do Amaral Fregonesi and Lucelma Maria dos Santos Cunha worked together in the writing and final revision of the manuscript.

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ENVIRONMENTAL DISCLOSURE LEVEL: A FIRMS’ PROACTIVE OR DEFENSIVE POSTURE?

ABSTRACT