Corporate Government

Business Strategy and the Environment Bus. Strat. Env. 12, 279–291 (2003) Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI: 10.1002/bse.370

TRENDS IN SUSTAINABILITY REPORTING BY THE FORTUNE GLOBAL 250

Ans Kolk University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam Graduate Business School, The Netherlands

Against the background of critique on the negative social and environmental implications of globalization, multinational enterprises have become active in reporting on activities undertaken to prevent these ‘externalities’ of international trade and production. This article analyses to what extent and in what form the trend towards nonfinancial reporting, which started in the 1990s, has continued in the 21st century. It presents both trend and panel data of the Fortune Global 250 in 1998 and 2001, showing a continued and significant rise of sustainability reporting to approximately half of these multinationals, with some sector and country variations. One-third of the reports are externally verified. Especially in Europe and Japan, the ‘sustained’ nature of sustainability reporting is accompanied by regulatory requirements and government encouragements. The

* Correspondence to: Professor Ans Kolk, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam Graduate Business School, Roetersstraat 11, 1018 WB Amsterdam, The Netherlands. E-mail: akolk@uva.nl

number of reports that includes social (and sometimes also financial) issues has increased considerably. The article also shows that in these reports the more ‘traditional’ topics, on the environment, corporate philanthropy and employees, receive much more attention than the broader external societal issues. It concludes with a reflection on the extent to which current forms of disclosure might address the concerns raised about multinationals’ behaviour. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.

Received 1 August 2002 Revised 24 November 2002 Accepted 10 February 2003

INTRODUCTION

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