Environmental disclosures and compulsory accounting standards: the case of spanish annual reports

Abstract This paper analyses environmental reporting practices found in the annual reports published by 51 large companies operating in Spain, with the aim of determining which factors in the firms analysed – belonging to ecologically sensitive sectors – explain the quantity and characteristics of the environmental information published and its evolution. Moreover, the paper takes into account the implementation of the Spanish compulsory accounting standard of 25 March 2002 and its impact on the environmental reporting behaviour. The results of the content analysis for the period 2001–02 show a significant increase in the environmental information compared with the 1992–94 period. For the first year in which the environmental accounting standard was in force (2002), the results show a high percentage of environmental disclosures in the notes to the annual accounts, although the degree and level of disclosures is very heterogeneous, in both form as well as quantity and quality. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.