The role of accounting and the accountant in the environmental management system

This paper explores the role of accounting and the accountant in the Environmental Management System (EMS). This study was founded on a postal survey of chief executive officers (CEOs) and chief financial officers (CFOs) from the top 500 listed Australian companies. From responses to the surveys, this paper firstly documents the adoption of environmental accounting processes by respondent companies and secondly management attitudes as to the role of environmental accounting in these companies. The senior executives responding to the survey suggest that they believe the environment is an important issue, and recognize the need for a business response. However, there appeared to be limited participation of the accountant in the EMS, which suggests there is a gap between the aggregate observations of this sample and literature support with respect to the role of environmental accounting. It is suggested that this might reflect a lack of understanding of the potential role accounting and the accountant could (and arguably should) play as a member of the EMS team. It is the intention of this paper to provide some input to enhance an understanding of the potential and important role accounting and the accountant could play in the EMS. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. and ERP Environment     

The role of accrual accounting in restricting dividends to shareholders

This paper addresses the question why net earnings and other accrual accounting numbers are frequently used to restrict dividends to shareholders. Even though this role of accrual accounting is widely accepted in the literature, a theory explaining the role of accruals in dividend restrictions is still in its early stages. Building on the principal–agent framework, I argue that basic features of the accrual process can be viewed as arising from the demand for dividend restrictions mitigating debt-related incentive problems. This explanation is consistent with the observation that, historically, debt contracting, dividend restrictions and the development of accrual accounting have been closely related. The basic idea is that the use of transactions and events in the accrual process leads to a contingent specification of the upper bound on dividends in an earnings-based constraint. Transactions and events used in the accrual process can be viewed as imperfect, but verifiable indicators for (unverifiable) determinants of debt-related incentive problems. This general idea is applied to incentive problems that regularly arise in a multi-period context. The paper demonstrates that the accrual process may mitigate distortions in shareholders' investment decisions using provisions and depreciation charges as examples.     

基于合同环境服务的农村环境效益核算方法研究

环境效益核算方法是农村开展合同环境服务必须解决的重要课题,是用来评价合同环境服务实施后产生的环境效益的一个数量尺度。文章基于对我国农村环境保护情况的长期研究,并参考有关研究资料,提出将环境效益核算的指标设定为:生态效益、社会效益和经济效益,并进一步衍生出14项二级指标,最后,采用层次分析法来确定各个指标的权重。     

油田企业战略环境管理会计体系的构建设想

本文试图以油田企业这种能源型和环境型企业为立足点,探讨油田企业要走可持续发展之路就必须建立战略环境管理会计体系的问题,并提出了初步的设想。     

浅议企业环境会计制度的构建

我国目前对企业环境会计制度的研究尚处于起步阶段,尚未形成一套公认的、可以在实务中运用的环境会计制度。文章借鉴国外已有的研究成果,对环境会计制度的构建内容进行初步研究,并对在我国开展企业环境会计制度构建工作提出相关措施。     

环境管理会计理论与实务问题分析

环境管理会计作为管理会计创新的组成部分,其理论研究和实务在过去十年里得到迅速发展．本文对国际上解决常规管理会计中有关问题的EMA理论研究和实务现状进行了分析,回顾了国际上有关行业的EMA 案例,分析了其存在问题,探讨了环境管理会计在投资评估、成本计算以及绩效管理等方面的进一步工作．     

经济增长、环境因素与我国经济发展方式转变

随着人们对经济发展内涵的认识不断深入,经济增长与环境之间的关系越来越受到关注和重视。研究发现,经济增长与环境之间存在着＂倒U＂型关系,即经济增长导致环境恶化,且在经济增长到一定水平时出现拐点,环境得到改善。认识并运用这一发现对当前我国调整产业政策,发展节能环保产业,加快经济增长方式转变,实现经济增长与环境改善共赢,具有重要意义。     

Ambidextrous culture,contextual ambidexterity and new product innovations: The role of organizational slack and environmental factors

Contextual ambidexterity, defined as the simultaneous pursuit of alignment and adaptability at business unit, is linked to several organizational outcomes including improved performance and innovation outcomes. Extant research posits ambidextrous organizational culture as an important enabler to contextual ambidexterity but suffers from a lack of a well‐meaning scale for the same. In addition, there is very little understanding as to how tasking and facilitating environment can be on firms' endeavour for contextual ambidexterity and the outcomes thereof. Therefore, the current piece of research has twin objectives using two separate studies. First, to develop a scale for ambidextrous organizational culture construct and second, to analyse the role played by the external forces (munificence and dynamism) and internal slack resources on the relationships between ambidextrous organizational culture and contextual ambidexterity and between contextual ambidexterity and new product innovation outcomes through an empirical investigation in India. Using structural equation modelling on data from 414 respondents, we found environmental munificence to strengthen the relationships between ambidextrous organizational culture and contextual ambidexterity and between contextual ambidexterity and new product innovation outcomes. On the other hand, environmental dynamism had a dampening impact on these relationships. Our findings also suggest that for low slack organizations, dynamic and unmunificent environments magnified the negative impact on an organisation's ambidexterity efforts and new product innovation outcomes.     

基于环保因素的电源扩建项目研究

节能环保是现代工业发展的大趋势和国家工业规划的必然要求,作为国民经济基础产业的电力行业能否节约能源、符合环保需要已经成为电力系统不可回避的现实问题.文章从电力系统的源头--电源扩建项目进行研究,根据项目建设时考虑的环保标准,基于环保因素提出项目扩建的实施措施.     

企业环境会计信息的披露及审计风险防范

从企业外部监督者的角度看,要求企业披露环境会计信息,这是使企业提高环境意识的一种外部约束,使企业无形中形成加强环境保护的压力,使企业的经济活动及经济行为更加符合社会的需要,符合人们不断追求提高生活质量、生态环境质量的需要。     

The role of accounting and the accountancy profession in economic development: A research agenda

A widely held view in the accountancy profession and the donor community is that accounting and the accountancy profession play an essential role in economic development. However, our review of the academic literature finds limited empirical research evidence on the relation between accounting and the accountancy profession and economic development, including specifically whether any such relation is causal, and if so, the direction of the causality. Entities, including those comprising the donor community, policymakers, and professional accountancy organizations (PAOs), need evidence on the question of whether and how the accountancy profession contributes to economic development. Such research could assist donors in evaluating the outcomes of interventions aimed at building the capacity of PAOs in emerging and developing economies and inform future interventions. We summarize the limited academic research addressing the relation between PAOs and economic development and present insights from two roundtables facilitated by the International Association for Accounting Education and Research. We identify research opportunities and research design considerations. We hope our paper will stimulate accounting researchers to advance this literature.     

The political economy of environmental and social security policies: the role of environmental lobbying

Social security provides retirement benefits to the old at the expense of the working young, while environmental investment benefits the future of the young at the expense of the old. This paper presents a model incorporating this intergenerational conflict on public spending and considers the political determination of environmental investment and social security by focusing on the Markovian political equilibria. It is shown that (1) the political equilibria are generally inefficient, and (2) the introduction of environmental lobbying into politics may improve environmental quality but degrade lifetime utility in the long run.      

The role of demographic factors in interest rate forecasting

Slowly moving fundamental time series can be mistaken for time trends. Use of this series can increase credibility of medium-term and long-term forecasts. This paper introduces a new slowly moving fundamental time series—the age distribution of the US population—to explain trends in real US interest rates over the past 35 years. We argue that lifecycle consumption patterns at the individual level can influence aggregate saving and real interest rates. Empirical evidence is presented that supports the relationship between age distribution and expected real interest rates. Simulations of future interest rates are developed.     

The role of spatial scale in the timing of uncertain environmental policy

The spatial scale of an environmental problem is dictated by boundaries. Physical boundaries limit the extent of impacts while the scale of decision making creates perceived boundaries beyond which impacts are ignored by decision makers. While it is well understood that uncertainty and irreversibility will alter policy decisions aimed at alleviating environmental impacts, the effect of spatial scales, both physical and perceived, is less understood. When spatial scale is included in a real options model of environmental policy adoption results indicate that the importance and influence of spatial considerations depends on the level of uncertainty, stringency of the proposed policy and flexibility of the policy decision. Recognizing spatial scale may force policy adoption to take place within a window of current damage. When spatial scale is small or uncertainty high, this window for policy adoption can close precluding policy adoption entirely. This undermines well-known results demonstrating that changes in uncertainty will only alter the timing of policy adoption. In other instances, the policy adoption window remains open but the option value increases faster than the benefits of the policy creating a scenario where it is always preferable to delay. Here the inclusion of an option value can prevent adoption of policies that would be adopted according to traditional cost-benefit analysis. In general policy decisions will be most affected by spatial considerations when the spatial scale is small, damage is spreading fast, and the uncertainty in damage spread is high.     

基于公司治理的环境会计理论框架的构建

本文从公司治理的角度,以相关者利益最大化为企业的目标来构建环境会计理论的框架,将环境会计纳入财务会计的范畴,对是否沿用财务会计的基本理论体系、环境会计成本和收益的确认、金额的计量以及如何在报表中披露等问题进行了分析。     

A Map of Neverland: The role of policy in strategic environmental management

Emerging environmental management system standards and environmentally conscious academics promote the strategic planning role of environmental policies, but frequently ignore their strategic visioning role. It is argued in this paper that an environmental policy should based on strategic visioning and act as a starting point of strategic planning. Thus an environmental policy could link strategic visioning and planning. The policy should also communicate the environmental goals of a company and the means to reach those goals. To contribute to the fulfilment of the company's mission, the environmental goals and means (strategies) need to be integrated into and co-ordinated with general business goals and strategies. It is claimed here that an environmental policy has multiple strategic roles: strategic visioning, communicating, strategic planning, linking strategic visioning and planning, and integrating and co-ordinating. To support this claim, these five potential roles of an environmental policy are explored at the corporate, divisional and operating unit levels of Shell and Texaco. It is maintained that environmental policies have an enormous inherent strategic potential which can be released by building, maintaining and implementing the policies in such a way that they can fulfil all their strategic roles. © 1997 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.     

Banks' environmental policy and business outcomes: The role of competition

By integrating the two areas of competition–performance and environment–performance, this research explores if competition matters in the relationship between environmental practices and interest margins in the market. A panel of 458 banks from 74 countries for the period of 2006–2016 is used, and the sample is further divided into developed and developing countries. This paper uses the system Generalized Method of Moments estimator to tackle potential omitted variable bias, endogeneity, and simultaneity issues. Without competition, environmental practices only affect banks in developing countries; however, the results show a significant impact for the full sample, including developed countries, when the competition is taken into consideration, suggesting that competition might play a role in the relationship of environmental practices and interest margins. In the full sample, competition impacts the relationship negatively after a moderate level of competition is reached in the market. The environmental practices in developing countries are prone to competition in the market. In developed countries, the competition is found to be lightly positively moderating the impact of environmental practices on interest margins. Based on these findings, it is recommended that developing countries should have a low or moderate level of competition to encourage environmental practices. For developed countries, however, high competition should be preferred to encourage banks to consider environmental practices as one of their core business strategies. These findings are found robust to different statistical estimators.     

The impact of ISO 14001 on firm environmental and economic performance: The moderating role of size and environmental awareness

This paper analyzes the impact of adopting the ISO 14001 standard on firm environmental and economic performance. In particular, it is argued that the degree of environmental awareness of the society (EAS) and firm size are two factors moderating the effect of ISO 14001 on firm performance. A number of hypotheses are formulated and empirically tested on an international sample of 583 listed companies in 46 countries over the period of 2009–2018. The findings show that (i) ISO 14001 adoption contributes to reducing firm carbon emission intensity and increasing firm profitability; (ii) the impact of ISO14001 on profitability is greater for companies from countries with high EAS and for larger firms; and (iii) the impact of ISO 14001 on carbon intensity is greater for headquartered in countries with low EAS. Managerial and policy implications resulting from the widespread adoption of certifiable environmental standards are also discussed.