Australian Commonwealth Entities: An Analysis of Their Environmental Disclosures

Environmental disclosures of Australian public‐sector entities have received scant attention by researchers. Using descriptive statistics, this paper provides an exploratory analysis of the environmental disclosures of a sample of Commonwealth public‐sector entities. Following consideration of approaches to accountability and expected trends in types of environmental disclosures and levels of disclosure in the public sector, the annual reports of sixty Commonwealth entities, over the ten‐year period 1984 to 1993, are examined. Based on the sample observations, the following results are found: as expected total environmental disclosures increased over the period; on average, budget entities reported a greater volume of environmental disclosures than non‐budget entities; over time there was an increase in internal relative to external disclosures for budget entities; non‐budget entities disclosed less internal environmental data than budget entities; the predominant form of environmental disclosure was qualitative rather than physical or financial; and, finally, seven themes were evident in the disclosures identified, the greatest volume being community education and training, and energy‐related disclosures. Comment is made on the possible reasons for these observations. Finally, future directions for the work in this area are explored, including consideration of possible new accountability structures based on ecological considerations and measurable environmental outcomes.