Evaluating corporate environmental reporting

In the field of environmental reporting, three recent tendencies can be noted. Firstly, some countries have started to impose legal obligations on firms. Secondly, a less stringent, implicit societal demand to be open on environmental issues has arisen from both primary and secondary stakeholders. Thirdly, those firms that do report experience an increasing need to move from environmental statements and intentions to quantified, comparable, verifiable and even verified information. These developments also affect evaluation systems of environmental reports. Ratings and research differ with regard to the normative character of the approach, the importance attached to principles of external reporting, the criteria on the basis of which the reports are collected and the method of data collection. Based on an analysis of different rating systems and their results, it can be concluded that such evaluations will increasingly advance beyond the stage of counting individual reporting components, paying more attention to reliability, consistency and relevance. Meeting such stricter requirements will have implications for both practitioners and academics. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.