Exploring a Nexus among Voluntary Environmental Sustainability Disclosure, ISO Certifications and Award, Sustainable Development Goals and Firm Performance

doi:10.21203/rs.3.rs-3344690/v1

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Exploring a Nexus among Voluntary Environmental Sustainability Disclosure, ISO Certifications and Award, Sustainable Development Goals and Firm Performance

https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-3344690/v1

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Corporate environmental disclosure has always been a major topic in discussions about environmental concerns, such as depletion of natural resources, material consumption, water resources, GHG emission, waste management and environmental laws. The incorporation of environmental disclosure in the business sector is in its early stages, particularly in the spectrum of listed manufacturing companies. The literature exploring corporate environmental disclosure in the context of Pakistan is scant, the present study fills this gap on conducting research on two stages. In first stage, the study aims to explore the quantity and quality of corporate environmental disclosure in accordance with Global Reporting Initiative guidelines and in second stage, explore the linkage among environmental award, industry sensitivity, ISO 14001, sustainable development goal 13 and firm performance with environmental disclosure in Pakistan. The hypotheses of the study examined through System GMM model to quantify the interrelationships. Results indicate that award, sensitivity, ISO 14001 and SDG 13 shows a substantial relationship with corporate environmental disclosure. However, it exhibits no link with firm performance metrics. This study expands the existing literature by focusing on GRI dimensions and examine the relationship in the light of stakeholder and legitimacy theory. On these bases, recommendations have been made for regulatory bodies to take measures mandating environmental sustainability disclosures in Pakistan. These actions will empower businesses to align economic growth with environmental responsibility and fostering a more sustainable future for the nation.

Corporate Environmental disclosure

Benchmarking-Scoring technique

Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX)

Global Reporting Initiatives (GRI)

Manufacturers exist within the natural environment, with corporate environmental disclosure emphasizing their deep ties to this ecosystem. Environmental degradation has become a global concern for sustainable manufacturing firms. Martens and Raza (2010) suggest that globalization has been a major consequence of sustainable development, highlighting how corporate environmental sustainability drives environmental progress through global integration. Moreover, environmental sustainability has evolved into an ideological framework aimed at mitigating environmental degradation (Chithambo et al., 2020; Dagiliene et al., 2020). The escalating severity of climate change on a global scale, as evidenced by Benlemlih et al. (2020) and Chowdhury et al. (2020), has accelerated this transformation. Consequently, environmental reporting is a daunting concern for academics and policymakers worldwide in the contemporary context of globalization and competitive business climate (Benlemlih et al., 2020; Niesche & Haase, 2012).

Evidence provide that companies either small or large, causing environmental deterioration (Balasubramanian et al., 2021). Larger firms prioritize environmental sustainability challenges due to its size, age and operations (Rehman et al., 2021). Environmental deterioration and the severity of environmental issues create awareness among stakeholders to pay more attention to companies' environmental responsibilities (Lu et al., 2018). Promoting the 2030 agenda of Sustainable Development Goals (2019) urges businesses to maintain environment-friendly business operations and implement SDG 13 in their business operations. The aim of SDG 13 is to streamline environmental issues into proper national policies after the parliamentarian manifesto (Latif et al., 2022).

Large scale listed companies disclose their environmental related issues less in CSR reports as evidenced from Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) database. The GRI database furnish information about those companies that follow the international sustainability standards for environmental reporting (Ruiz-Frutos et al., 2019). The manufacturing sector is primarily made up of large scale units and contribute 12.79% to the GDP of Pakistan. Global Climate Risk Index 2021, presents that Pakistan ranked 5th in the world most vulnerable to climate change and faces the highest disaster risk in the world, ranked 18 out of 191 countries (Climate Change Knowlege Portal, 2023). On the eve of World Clean Air Day, Junaidi (2022) reported at least 128,000 deaths are recorded and over 6.5 million individuals are hospitalized annually in Pakistan (Mehdi, 2019). Tragically, the average life expectancy of a Pakistani has been curtailed by 4.3 years due to environmental deterioration. Pakistan bears environmental degradation costs at least 6 percent of the GDP or about rupees 365 billion (Strategic country environmental assessment, 2021). Furthermore, Pakistan finds itself among the distressing statistic of 12 out of 15 Asian countries where industrial pollution has reached severe and intolerably high levels.

As the consequences of environmental pollution around the globe, particularly in developing nations like Pakistan need advanced research, widespread awareness campaigns, and pollution reduction measures. Ideally, manufacturing companies have to share information about material and water usage, carbon emissions, waste disposal methods and disclosure of other environmental issues for the concerned stakeholders (Liesen et al., 2017) as manufacturing companies are the major source of carbon emissions and other hazardous projects (Li et al., 2018). Different stakeholders want to know about the environmental condition of a company, but its company’s discretion to inform them (Belal et al., 2015; Li et al., 2018) and private firms disclose more environmental information under legitimized pressure (Chen et al., 2023). There are many protection laws and agencies such as Pakistan Environmental Protection Act 1997, Pakistan Environmental Protection Council, Energy Efficiency and Conservation Authority (ENERCON), Pakistan Forest Institute, National Council for Conservation of Wildlife, to safeguard, conserve and improve the environment through sustainable development measures (Zameenblog, 2023).

Given the aforementioned context, our study contributes to the literature on listed manufacturing companies and cater to in-depth analysis of the environmental disclosure according to the GRI index. Research have been identified as in relation to (і) analyze the documents to explore the quality and quantity of environmental disclosure by using GRI index; (іі) the relation among variables with the degree of environmental disclosure. For this purpose, a checklist of 30 environmental dimensions issued by GRI has been used to analyze the annual reports, assign a score to individual dimensions, and check the level of disclosure of each environmental dimension. This study also seeks to test whether corporate attributes such as environmental award, company sensitivity, ISO 14001, SDG 13, firm performance (ROA, ROE), firm size and firm age influence the corporate environmental disclosure made by the companies participating in research. Panel data regression analysis shows that nonfinancial intuitions, which are larger, tend to disclose environmental information since they are confronted with pressure from a diverse group of stakeholders and society. This remaining paper is structured as follows: Section 2 comprises the review of literature and hypotheses development, Section 3 contains the research methodology and sources of data, Section 4 investigates the environmental disclosure scores from 2017 to 2022 and presents disclosure level through benchmarking-scoring technique and investigate empirically the effect of corporate environmental disclosure on firm performance. Section 5 contains the discussion and presents limitations and directions for future research.

2.1 Environmental disclosure reporting

The World Bank Group’s Country Climate and Development Report (CCDR) shows that Pakistan’s GDP is expected to decrease by at least 18 to 20% by 2050 due to environmental degradation and air pollution (OCHA, 2022). The World Health Organization (WHO) also highlight the vulnerability of the environment around the globe, especially in South Asian nations (Nurunnabi, 2015). Researchers have investigated the components that influence the company’s environmental reporting or disclosure (Chithambo et al., 2020; Elsayih et al., 2021). Corporate environmental disclosure is necessitated by the stakeholders to address the negative impacts of corporate operations on the environment (Chithambo et al., 2020) and legitimize its operations. Another side of environmental impacts change consumer buying behavior, desire to purchase environment-friendly goods, and corporate environmental disclosure reporting (Song et al., 2019). Environmental disclosure reporting is required by society (Taoketao et al., 2018), and related parties have an interest in and influence companies to disclose environmental information.

Environmental Disclosure and Environmental Award

Regarding environmental disclosure, different awards have been launched by government, NGOs, and regulatory authorities to respond ethically and satisfying the informational needs of stakeholders (Kolk & Perego, 2010). Environmental awards have emerged as pivotal instruments in bolstering a company's credibility and winning the stakeholder's trust (Spada, 2008). One of the major factor that influence the company managers to attain environmental award is the environmental disclosure level (Hassan & Ibrahim, 2012). Notably, environmental award is considered to be a gesture of better environmental disclosure level and observed to be higher in carbon-intensive companies. To test the relationship, the hypothesis can be formally stated as follows:

H₁: There is a significant, positive association between environmental awards and corporate environmental disclosure.

2.6 Environmental Disclosure and Industry Sensitivity

Different economic and environmental risks have been associated with different industries (Sarni, 2013). Companies from Industries classified as “environmental sensitivities” such as chemicals, pharmaceuticals, petroleum, oil exploration, and paper industries (Hackston & Milne, 1996; Patten, 2002) focus to disclose more information about environment. Many researches also report that companies whose operations have high pressure from environment (Aerts & Cormier, 2009) furnish extensive information about environmental discharge. Prior literature shows that firms with high environmental risks disclose more information and try to reduce the risk (Düsterhöft et al., 2020). Sensitive firms faced many obstacles from stakeholders (Radhouane et al., 2020) as corporate environmental disclosure required extra investment and master plans to be shaped (Liao et al., 2015). Hence potential environmental sensitivity effects are examined as follows:

H₂: There is a significant, positive association between industry sensitivity and corporate environmental disclosure.

International organization for standardization 14001 (ISO 14001) and environmental disclosure

Environmental management system (EMS) guide business firms to follow international guidelines to cope the environmental concerns (Halis & Halis, 2016). In the realm of environmental sustainability, EMSs constitute the official tools employed to accomplish environmental sustainability and ISO 14001:2015 regulations helps to attain higher environmental performance (Fonseca, 2015). ISO 14001 stands out as the globally recognized and most widely adopted environmental management standard (Huang & Ho, 2017). The ISO 14001 certification, initially established in 1996 and subsequently amended in 2004 and 2015, has emerged as the predominant EMS employed on a global scale (Abid et al., 2021). The latest version ISO 14001:2015 certification applies on all types of businesses despite its age, size, it helps businesses to achieve environmental sustainability (Abid et al., 2021; Fonseca, 2015). EMSs foster the eco-friendly activities and peruse the organizational manager to achieve environmental sustainable development objectives (Salim et al., 2018). To test the relationship between ISO 14001 and environmental disclosure, the research hypothesis can be formed as follows:

H₃: There is a significant, positive association between environmental certification and corporate environmental disclosure.

Environmental Disclosure and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)

The perspective of sustainability underscores an organization's responsibility to conduct its operations in a manner that serves the broader interests of society and the environment. Sustainable Development Goal 13 (SDG 13), focused on climate action. The SDGs reporting is a crucial indicator of sustainability and extracted form annual reports of companies (Montiel, 2008). A legitimacy gap occurs when there is a contradiction between organizational activities and societal expectations. Since companies received pressure from stakeholders such as media, governments, not-for-profit organizations, and international professional agencies to adopt SDGs to rescue the environment and meet societal needs (Silva, 2021). Prior literature also highlights environmentally sensitive industries; the results found that SDGs disclosure offered legitimation of firm performance as SDGs used as a tool to enhance firm value (Emma & Jennifer, 2021). The SDGs have a crucial role in developed and developing countries and contribute for the attainment of SDGs (Sachs, 2012). The hypothesis is as follows:

H₄: A significant, positive association exists between sustainable development goals (SDGs) and corporate environmental disclosure.

Environmental Disclosure and Firm Performance

With the emergence of environmental concerns, scholarly literature has increasingly focused on the nexus between environmental disclosure and firm performance within emerging markets. During the review of past studies, the results were mixed as used different methods to measure the variables (Al-Tuwaijri et al., 2004; Wiseman, 1982). Some previous studies found a positive influence on the firm performance by increasing the environmental disclosure or environmental performance (Dianita, 2011; Khlif et al., 2015; Lucy Wenxiang Lu & Taylor, 2018).

According to the study, Purnomo and Widianingsih (2012) investigated the same relationship and found a significant positive relationship between variables. A previous study was conducted on Malaysian and Indonesian palm companies to examine the environmental quality and firm performance through content analysis using the GRI guidelines. The study has suggested that Indonesian companies' disclosure level lacks accountability and transparency on environmental issues. In contrast, Malaysian companies furnish slightly greater disclosure level year by year, and results are consistent that environmental disclosure has better firm performance (Abdullah et al., 2020). However, a study done by Sarumpaet (2005) on Indonesian companies found no relationship between environmental disclosure and firm performance. Chiong (2010) conducted research on firm performance (ROE) and found a negative relationship between firm performance and environmental disclosure. The hypothesis can be formally stated as follows:

H₅: Financial performance and corporate environmental disclosure have a significant, positive association.

Theoretical Foundation

Stakeholder theory and Legitimacy theory

Theoretical underpinnings have played a crucial role in the examination of corporate social and environmental reporting, offering diverse perspectives to elucidate the variations in environmental disclosures among businesses. Previous research has delved into factors affecting nonfinancial disclosure, with particular emphasis on legitimacy theory and stakeholder theory as frameworks to elucidate firms' voluntary nonfinancial disclosure behaviors (Adler et al., 2017; Cho et al., 2015; Christensen et al., 2019). Stakeholder theory directs attention to specific segments of society and various stakeholder groups that exert influence on companies to disseminate environmental disclosure information. Conversely, legitimacy theory adopts a broader societal perspective (Deegan & Blomquist, 2006). Under the tenets of legitimacy theory, firms furnish nonfinancial information to all stakeholders, including contributors to the capital market, as a means to regulate their perceived legitimacy (Donovan, 2002). As postulated by Cho and Patten (2007), the legitimacy theory posits that corporate environmental reporting is contingent upon social and political pressures that prompt businesses to enhance their environmental performance. In response to these demands, environmental information is a communication mechanism that company managers use with the aim of preserving their reputation as legitimate entities and averting the adverse repercussions of legitimacy crises (Villiers & Staden, 2006). Disclosure of information is way to achieve legitimacy by adopting rules, values and beliefs set in a society.

As already mentioned above, this paper has a twofold objective. First, it focuses on the quality and quantity of corporate environmental (CEN) information disclosure as an essential component of annual or CSR reports. Secondly, it evaluates other factors that impact firms' current environmental reporting. To do so, an integrated methodological framework was designed based on model 1, consisting of content analysis and model 2 for statistical analysis. The proposed framework consists of two stages, evaluation, and analysis, which have been analyzed in the following sections.

Model 1

Environmental disclosure Model

[INSERT FIGURE 1 HERE]

Model 2

Statistical Analysis Model

[INSERT FIGURE 2 HERE]

Evaluation Stage

This stage is dedicated to the estimation of corporate environmental (CEN) disclosure within manufacturing firms. It involves a meticulous evaluation of both the quality and quantity of CEN information made available, serving as a means to gauge the level of accountability and transparency exhibited. To execute this stage effectively, several essential components are required, including a sample of annual or Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) reports, CEN indicators based on the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) framework, and a sophisticated scoring system. Corporate annual or CSR reports represent a primary source of invaluable corporate environmental disclosure data, while the scoring system functions as a critical tool, translating qualitative information into quantitative metrics for the purpose of quantifying a firm's corporate environmental performance.

Population and Sample Selection

To accomplish the objectives of this research, a purposive sampling technique was used to gather annual or sustainability from Pakistan Stock Exchange. This study considers a total of 210 firms listed on the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX), comprising pharmaceuticals, cement, power generation, Sugar and Allied Mills, Oil & Gas Exploration, Oil & Gas Marketing, Chemicals, Fertilizer, Engineering, Automobile Assembler, Cable & Electrical goods, Leather, Glass & Ceramics, Tobacco, Paper & Board, Food and Personal Care, Textile Composite, Textile Spinning and Woolen.

Corporate environmental indicators

Numerous methods exist to assess the disclosure level of CEND information, but firms still need help with many challenges. There is no generally accepted CEN accounting system to assess corporate performance on EN issues. Furthermore, financial accounting furnishes information on the costs of environmental practices of firms, but nonfinancial information is also required to evaluate companies' environmental conditions and reporting trends. To get better off, this paper produces information according to the GRI guidelines. The proposed methodology used only GRI-based indicators to examine the CEN disclosure information because most of the company's sustainability reporting used GRI standards to disclose environmental issues. For this purpose, thirty indicators were selected to pick up the data. These indicators have been taken from the GRI’s G4 reporting guidelines (GRI, 2013) and focused on extracting data according to these CEN indicators. Table 1 describes the CEN indicators used in this methodology and shows their connectivity with GRI indicators. Thirty environmental disclosure indicators are broken down into twelve subcategories: materials, energy, water, biodiversity, emissions, effluents, and waste, products and services, compliance, overall supplier environmental assessment, and environmental grievance mechanisms.

[INSERT TABLE 1 HERE]

Environmental Disclosure Scoring Index

This section discusses the methodologies suggested to assess nonfinancial information, such as those provided by annual or CSR reports. Overall these methodologies can be classified into two general groups: (a) content analysis and (b) benchmarking-scoring technique (Al-Tuwaijri et al., 2004; Nikolaou & Tsalis, 2013).

A manual content analysis technique was used to access the quality and quantity of environmental disclosure information (Costa & Agostini, 2016). The content analysis technique is used widely when information is available in text, explanations, tables, and pictures (Bell et al., 2022). Although this method is based on an in-depth analysis of the text, it is time-consuming and labor extensive (EC, 2017). The second part of the methodologies utilized to evaluate the annual reports or CSR reports is a benchmarking-scoring framework. A disclosure index based on the GRI Sustainability Reporting Guidelines (GRI) published in 2002 was developed and used as a benchmark for this research. The major benefit of the benchmarking-scoring technique is to measure "what type of information" provided by the companies in annual or CSR reports (Wiseman, 1982) and assign a score to the provided qualitative information according to the disclosure level.

The framework of this study is based on the benchmarking-scoring technique, which is used to assess the quality of environmental information published in corporate annual reports or sustainability or social reports. The six-point scale used to award the score for the sustainability reporting index in this paper was adapted from (Janggu et al., 2014). The six-point scale awarded 0 = No disclosure, 1 = Items (GRI sub-indicators) has general disclosure (one to two lines disclosure), 2 = Brief description (in three to five sentences), 3 = detailed disclosure (more than five sentences), 4 = Brief description with the amount spent on an item, 5 = Detailed explanation of item with proper costing. For checking the level of disclosure, this study used GRI based 30 environmental dimensions and applied benchmarking-scoring for this assessment(GRI, 2013).

[INSERT TABLE 2 HERE]

In the next step, the Total Accountability Index (TAI) was calculated as the sum of the scores of each CEN indicator (Eq.1)

The average TAI score is the sum of AI scores

TAI\(={\sum }_{i=1}^{30}{AI}_{i}\)

Variables and their Measurement

[INSERT TABLE 3 HERE]

Stage 2 environmental statistical model

The following model is constructed to investigate the effects of corporate sustainability reporting on firm performance as follows:

CEND _it=β + β₁ ENAW_it+ β₂SEN_it + β₃ ISO14001 + β₄SDGs _it+ β₅ROA _it+ β₆ROE _it+ β₇Firm size_it + β₈Firm age_it + μ_{1 it}

It comprises two sections. First, it sheds light on the quality of corporate environmental disclosure, and second shows the END impacts on other variables.

Stage 1 Disclosure Analysis Results

[INSERT TABLE 4 HERE]

The quality of CEND was measured by using the benchmarking scoring technique. Table 2 plots the average TAI Scores for corporate environmental disclosure of manufacturing companies for the years 2017-2021. This qualitative assessment has been used to calculate the accountability index (AI). Fig. 3 depicts the average score of various CEND based on GRI guidelines as standard.

Table 3 represents the quality of CEND in 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021, obtained in the current study using the benchmarking-scoring technique. The Table showed the quality level of CEND in the annual reports of manufacturing firms, which was poor, as the average TAI scores for 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2020 were 21.40, 21.56, 22.05, 22.57, and 26.70, respectively. While the threshold (75) and in all these years, TAI scores are lower than the threshold, TAI scores increased in 2021 compared to 2020. The TAI scores indicate that progress in the quality of CEND in the manufacturing sector of Pakistan is moving at a slower speed. However, companies are taking initiatives to implement environmental action, such as tree plantation in factory areas, reducing emissions, reusing waste material, and conducting awareness training programs for green initiatives.

Quality of Environmental Disclosure

The CEN disclosure level quality is presented in Figure 3. Figure 3 depicts the average score of corporate environmental disclosure based on the GRI standards. From 2020 to 2021, the average score of CEN disclosure was 21.4 in 2017, a slight increase from 2018 to 2020 but a major increase in 2021, and the TAI score was 26.7. In 2021, companies focused more on environmental disclosure to satisfy their stakeholders.

[INSERT FIGURE 3 HERE]

Fig. 3 sheds light on the environmental disclosure of listed firms operating in Pakistan for five years spanning from 2017 to 2021. The trend analysis shows a steady trend with a deviation meanwhile. From 2017 to onward, the sample firms publish their contribution toward the environment either in the narrative, quantitative, monetary or adopting GRI approaches simultaneously. The narrative approach is the most favored disclosure approach, followed by qualitative disclosure as observed in this study.

As per the figure, Pakistani companies provided slightly better disclosures year by year, indicating that they were attempting to improve their accountability and meet stakeholders’ information needs. The year-by-year expansion in accountability of manufacturing companies may be a response to increased environmental awareness in both the community and industry, especially after the increased pollution level in the air. The findings of this article are consistent with other studies (Abdullah et al., 2020; Akhter et al., 2023; Rustam et al., 2019).

[INSERT TABLE 5 HERE]

Table 4 reports the quality of CEND in percentages from 2017 to 2021, which was obtained in the current study using benchmarking techniques. Few sub-indicators in this Table presented the lowest values such as CEND7 (Reductions in energy requirements of products) has 0.09 or 9% disclosure level, CEND12 (significant impacts of activities, and products on biodiversity in protected areas) has 0.09 or 9% level of disclosure, CEND13 (Habitats protected or restored) has 0.04 or 4% value showed the level of discussion by the manufacturing companies, CEND14 (number of Red List species with habitats in areas affected by operations) has 0.03 or 3% disclosure level, CEND 20 (Emissions of ozone-depleting substances) has 0.06 or 6% level of disclosure, CEND24 (Total number and volume of significant spills) has 0,04 or 4% and CEND26 (Protected status and biodiversity value of water bodies and related habitats significantly affected by the organization's discharges of water) has lowest 0.01 or 1% disclosure level by the manufacturing companies in Pakistan. These tables highlight each item discussed in percentages by the manufacturing companies.

Statistical data analysis

This section covers the findings of multiple regression analysis extracted through dynamic panel model using xtdpdsys command.

[INSERT TABLE 5 HERE]

Table 5 presents the descriptive analysis of 1050 firm-year observations. The results indicate that the average value of CEND for all observations is 15.59%, indicating that the level of environmental disclosure in Pakistan is low. The findings is consistent with previous studies that the extent of CEN disclosure is not sufficient (Wang et al., 2020). The average proportion of getting environmental award is 20%. Approximately, 97.1% firms belong to highly environmental sensitive industries and only 7.42% firms adopting SDG 13 in their annual reports. The average financial performance rate for ROA is 5.51% and ROE is 10.08.

[INSERT TABLE 6 HERE]

This section discusses hypothesis testing. Table 6 provides coefficients, z value and p values to test the validity of the hypotheses. Table 6 reports the findings of dynamic panel model using xtdpdsys command. The relationship between corporate environmental disclosure and environmental award is significant (p value=0.002); similarly, the relationship between CEND and sensitivity is also significant (0 value =0.097) therefore supporting H1 and H2 respectively. Furthermore, the relationship between CEND and ISO 14001 award (p value =0.000), SDG 13 (p values = 0.001) are highly significant, therefore supporting H3 and H4 respectively. The relationship between ECN disclosure and ROA (p value =0.300), ROE (p value =0.296) is insignificant, therefore H5 and H6 are not supported. In other words, we can say that environmental disclosure has no impact on company’s profitability.

This study has addressed the environmental award has a significant positive influence on corporate environmental disclosure which implies that disclosing environmental information is an important aspect for acquiring an environmental award (Anas et al., 2015). The findings are in accord with extent literature (Hassan & Ibrahim, 2012; Solikhah & Maulina, 2021) and stakeholder theory posed that awards motivate the companies to disclose more transparent environmental disclosure to meet the needs of various concerned parties.

The manufacturing companies belongs to environmental sensitive industries are found to have significant positive impact on corporate environmental disclosure. This suggest that companies operating in highly sensitive industries are likely to place greater emphasis on and enhance the quality of environmental disclosure. Previous studies supported these results. For instance, companies in industries whose manufacturing processes substantially impact the environment systematically furnish greater corporate environmental disclosure information (Aerts & Cormier, 2009; Ali et al., 2018; Cho & Patten, 2007; Deegan, 2002). Moreover, another study aligns with the observation that companies with a high carbon intensity receive environmental awards more frequently than those with low carbon intensity (Hassan & Ibrahim, 2012).

ISO 14001 certificate EMS significantly influences corporate environmental disclosure. Environmental management system-certified firms disclose environmental information (Mitchell & Hill, 2009). For instance, the higher the proportion of ISO certification is, the better the environmental performance will be (Nguyen & Hens, 2015). The company's disclosure of the enactment of ISO 14001 enhances credibility and stakeholder confidence. This is another reason the presence of an EMS is disclosed as a potential factor that could affect a company's chances of receiving an environmental award. ISO 14001, stakeholder engagement, and environmental awards are major drivers for implementing environmental activities (energy, water usage, waste management, recycling, tree plantation, and climate change risk). Sustainable development goal 13 depicts that the implementation of SDG 13 will positively impact the implementation of corporate environmental disclosure. Prior research documented that 14.8 million GHG emissions per annum were reduced to achieve a sustainable environment (Latif et al., 2022). The linkage of SDG 13 in Pakistan is an in-depth relationship to sustainably achieve material, energy, water, and waste management. Ioannou and Serafeim (2017) state that SDGs implementation is part of the organizational goals and pushes the corporate sector to disclose information and move towards sustainability in operational activities.

The results found that profitability (ROA and ROE) do not influence the level of corporate environmental disclosure, which is aligned with (Rahman et al., 2009; Sarumpaet, 2005). Hence found, no support for the existence of the relationship rejects hypothesis H2, and these findings imply that CSR environmental-related initiatives have no significant change in financial performance (Tunio et al., 2021; Vogt et al., 2017). One explanation of this would be, the increased the environmental disclosure, that is related to ROA and ROE and spending on environmental activities reduces profitability.

The study has several theoretical and practical implications. First, until now, little literature exists on the quality and quantity of corporate environmental disclosure. To bridge the research gap, this study investigates the level of disclosure through benchmarking-scoring technique as in-depth analysis of annual reports and cover all environmental dimensions according to GRI. Multiple studies have discussed environmental disclosure; none has focus on all GRI based environmental index items in developing countries because it considers all information useful to stakeholders. This study investigates the level of disclosure in the light of stakeholder theory. Secondly, from the econometric perspective, Overall, this study extends the literature on CEND relationship with exogenous variables such as environmental award, ISO 14001 certification and SDGs found significant relationship and based on the legitimacy theory, company align its values according to the social norms. Public and Private sector companies need to adopt ISO 14001 certification, so that they comply their business operations according to the international laws and protect the environment. To fill the legitimacy gap, company need to win the environmental awards, get ISO 14001 certification and respond to SDGs in their official documents to address the demands of the stakeholders. Another logic to reporting corporate environmental sustainability is that firms implanting strategies practically to respond environmental changes (Momin & Parker, 2013). Lastly, managers, regulators, government and policymakers should take notice of the severity of environmental issues and make environmental protection cell with the application of GRI guidelines for disclosure and implementation of environment-friendly regulations in manufacturing sector.

The study aims to explore the level of corporate environmental disclosures from listed manufacturing companies and examine other factors to check the impact on corporate environmental disclosure. Interestingly, the level of corporate environmental disclosure quality and quantity shows an increasing trend from time to time. Previous studies focused on one or a few sectors from manufacturing industry. In contrast, this study covers all manufacturing sectors and unique in nature to consider 30 sub-dimensions of GRI environmental sustainability index. The majority of the firms did not consider all GRI indicators, though some firms apply GRI index for environmental disclosure, such as majority firms have qualitative disclosure or tree plantation campaigns to address this issue. Another distinctiveness of this study is to utilize quantitative content analysis for analyzing the amount of text or information (i.e. how much) and benchmarking technique used to gauge the quality of environmental information (i.e. what information) in annual or CSR reports. The findings revealed substandard level of environmental disclosure in Pakistan, TAI Scores in 2020 and 2021 were found to be 22.75 and 26.7, respectively, which is lower than the threshold score (75). The study strengthens the arguments of previous study that firms pay scant attention to other environmental topics

Based on the stakeholder theory and legitimacy theory, this study identified only eight companies named: Fatima Fertilizer, Fauji Fertilizer, Crescent Steels, Atlas Honda, ICI, Cherat Packaging, National Foods, and Azgard Nine have environmental disclosure according to the GRI guidelines. The empirical results provide evidence that those companies that are larger, environmentally sensitive have ISO certification, win environmental award and disclose more environmental information in their annual CSR reports. These findings constitute a notable contribution to the body of research, as they introduce a novel dimension by assessing the level of corporate environmental disclosure in accordance with the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) guidelines, an aspect not explored in prior studies by considering thirty sub-dimensions. Furthermore, the incorporation of Sustainable Development Goal 13 (SDG 13) represents another distinctive facet of this research. Conversely, the study's findings pertaining to the remaining variables, Return on Assets (ROA) and Return on Equity (ROE), reveal no significant relationship with the level of environmental disclosure. This outcome is in accordance with prior research, signifying that the disclosure of environmental information does not exert a discernible impact on firm performance (Nor et al., 2016) because environmental disclosure is cost incentive or need regular investment.

For future research, first, qualitative research methods, such as interviews with managerial personnel, to elucidate organizations' specific strategies and steps in environmental disclosure. Secondly, a comparative analysis between the manufacturing and service sectors, aiming to ascertain which sector places a greater emphasis on environmental disclosure quality. Finally, a cross-national study as environmental disclosure has different rules and expectations between countries.

Authors’ Biography

Shumaila Noreen is a PhD scholar at Hailey College of Commerce, University of the Punjab, Lahore. She is currently working as an assistant professor at Himayat-e-Islam Khwateen Lahore. She has one publications in her credit having Impact factor 6.392. Her areas of interest include: corporate sustainability, Environmental disclosure, Occupational health and safety, financial literacy, and firm performance evaluation. Email:[email protected]

Fouzia Hadi Ali is currently working as an assistant professor at Hailey College of Commerce, University of the Punjab, Lahore, Pakistan. She holds her PhD from University of the Punjab, Pakistan. She is a gold medalist in Master of Commerce from the same institute. She has published more than 43 papers along with paper presentations at international conferences. Her research interests include: behavioral intentions among employees, customers and students, organization commitment and perceived organizational support. Email: [email protected]

Author’s contribution All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection, and analysis were performed by N, S and A, F. The first draft of the manuscript was written by N, S and co- author commented on previous versions of the manuscript. Both authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Funding The authors declare that no funds, grants, or other support were received during the preparation of the manuscript.

Data availability The data is available with authors and can be made available on reasonable request.

Ethical approval Not applicable

Consent to participate Not applicable

Consent for publication All authors give consent to publish.

Competing interest The authors declare that they no competing interests.

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Table 1

Corporate environmental indicators (GRI, 2013)

CEN Indicators	Linkage with GRI indicators	Description of indicators
CEN1	Direct	Materials used by weight or volume
CEN2	Direct	Percentage of materials used that are recycled
CEN3	Direct	Direct energy consumption within the organization
CEN4	Direct	Energy consumption outside of the organization
CEN5	Direct	Energy intensity
CEN6	Direct	Reduction of energy consumption
CEN7	Direct	Reductions in energy requirements of products and services
CEN8	Direct	Total water withdrawal by source
CEN9		Water sources significantly affected by the withdrawal of water
CEN10	Direct	Percentage and total volume of water recycled and reused
CEN11	Direct	Operational sites owned and areas of high biodiversity value outside protected areas
CEN12	Direct	Description of significant impacts of activities, products, and services on biodiversity
CEN13	Direct	Habitats protected or restored
CEN14	Direct	Total number of Red List species and national conservation list species with habitats in areas affected by operations
CEN15	Direct	Direct greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions (Scope 1)
CEN16	Direct	Energy indirect greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions (Scope 2)
CEN17	Direct	Other indirect greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions (Scope 3)
CEN18	Direct	Greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions intensity
CEN19	Direct	Reduction of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions
CEN20	Direct	Emissions of ozone-depleting substances (ODS)
CEN21	Direct	NOx, SOx, and other significant air emissions
CEN22	Direct	Total water discharge by quality and destination
CEN23	Direct	Total weight of waste by type and disposal method
CEN24	Direct	Total number and volume of significant spills
CEN25	Direct	Weight of transported, imported, exported, or treated waste deemed hazardous
CEN26	Direct	The organization's water discharges significantly affect the identity, protected status, and biodiversity value of water bodies and related habitats.
CEN29	Indirect	The monetary value of significant fines for non-compliance with environmental laws and regulations
CEN32	Indirect	Percentage of new suppliers that were screened using environmental criteria
CEN33	Indirect	Significant actual and potential negative environmental impacts in the supply chain and actions taken
CEN34	Indirect	The number of grievances about environmental impacts filed, addressed, and resolved through formal grievance mechanisms.

Table 2

Environmental Disclosure Scoring Index

Codification	score	Description
Level 0	0	No Disclosure
Level 1	1	General Disclosure- 1 - 2 sentences
Level 2	2	Brief qualitative description-3 - 5 sentences
Level 3	3	Detailed qualitative explanation-more than 5 sentences
Level 4	4	Quantitative disclosure with a brief description- 1 to 5 sentences
Level 5	5	Qualitative disclosure with detailed explanation-more than 5 sentences

Source: (Jamil et al., 2021)

Table 3

Average TAI Score of Corporate Environmental Disclosure
GRI Items	2017	2018	2019	2020	2021
END1	4.88	4.88	4.88	4.88	4.87
END2	0.47	0.46	0.47	0.49	0.60
END3	3.85	3.85	3.85	3.86	3.87
END4	0.33	0.36	0.36	0.36	0.46
END5	1.09	1.09	1.10	1.11	1.16
END6	1.24	1.23	1.26	1.33	1.46
END7	0.24	0.25	0.25	0.26	0.30
END8	1.32	1.33	1.35	1.35	1.69
END9	0.36	0.34	0.36	0.36	0.61
END10	0.44	0.44	0.47	0.50	0.71
END11	0.86	0.83	0.91	0.99	1.40
END12	0.10	0.10	0.11	0.13	0.18
END13	0.06	0.06	0.06	0.09	0.11
END14	0.06	0.06	0.06	0.08	0.10
END15	0.80	0.82	0.83	0.87	1.18
END16	0.30	0.31	0.31	0.31	0.41
END17	0.30	0.31	0.31	0.31	0.35
END18	0.24	0.27	0.26	0.30	0.32
END19	0.85	0.88	0.90	0.96	1.29
END20	0.12	0.12	0.12	0.13	0.16
END21	0.32	0.32	0.38	0.38	0.45
END22	0.61	0.63	0.66	0.67	0.93
END23	1.09	1.11	1.20	1.23	1.35
END24	0.07	0.07	0.08	0.08	0.08
END25	0.42	0.43	0.45	0.48	0.66
END26	0.01	0.01	0.01	0.02	0.03
END29	0.47	0.48	0.48	0.46	1.05
END32	0.15	0.15	0.16	0.16	0.30
END33	0.19	0.19	0.20	0.21	0.26
END34	0.17	0.17	0.20	0.20	0.35
TAI Score	21.40	21.56	22.05	22.57	26.70
Threshold	75	75	75	75	75
Maximum TAI Score	150	150	150	150	150

Compiled by the author based on the GRI indicators report.

Note: CEND = Corporate Environmental Disclosure

Table 4

Separate Table with having Disclosure or Not with reference to GRI indicators
	No Reference					Reference
GRI Items	2017	2018	2019	2020	2021	2017	2018	2019	2020	2021
CEND1	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	0.00	1.00	1.00	1.00	1.00	1.00
CEND2	0.83	0.82	0.82	0.81	1.61	0.19	0.18	0.18	0.19	0.23
CEND3	0.05	0.05	0.05	0.05	0.10	0.95	0.95	0.95	0.95	0.95
CEND4	0.92	0.91	0.91	0.91	1.87	0.09	0.09	0.09	0.09	0.11
CEND5	0.71	0.71	0.71	0.71	1.47	0.29	0.29	0.29	0.29	0.30
CEND6	0.60	0.60	0.59	0.57	1.14	0.43	0.40	0.41	0.43	0.46
CEND7	0.92	0.92	0.92	0.91	1.91	0.09	0.08	0.08	0.09	0.09
CEND8	0.64	0.64	0.63	0.62	1.06	0.38	0.36	0.37	0.38	0.50
CEND9	0.83	0.83	0.83	0.83	1.48	0.17	0.17	0.17	0.17	0.30
CEND10	0.83	0.83	0.83	0.82	1.48	0.18	0.17	0.17	0.18	0.30
CEND11	0.72	0.72	0.70	0.67	1.13	0.33	0.28	0.30	0.33	0.46
CEND12	0.96	0.96	0.96	0.95	1.91	0.05	0.04	0.04	0.05	0.09
CEND13	0.98	0.98	0.98	0.97	2.01	0.03	0.02	0.02	0.03	0.04
CEND14	0.98	0.98	0.98	0.98	2.03	0.02	0.02	0.02	0.02	0.03
CEND15	0.69	0.68	0.67	0.66	1.14	0.34	0.32	0.33	0.34	0.46
CEND16	0.90	0.90	0.90	0.90	1.75	0.10	0.10	0.10	0.10	0.17
CEND17	0.90	0.90	0.90	0.90	1.83	0.10	0.10	0.10	0.10	0.13
CEND18	0.94	0.93	0.93	0.92	1.93	0.08	0.07	0.07	0.08	0.08
CEND19	0.65	0.64	0.64	0.63	1.11	0.37	0.36	0.36	0.37	0.47
CEND20	0.96	0.96	0.96	0.96	1.97	0.04	0.04	0.04	0.04	0.06
CEND21	0.89	0.89	0.87	0.87	1.76	0.13	0.11	0.13	0.13	0.16
CEND22	0.78	0.76	0.76	0.76	1.33	0.24	0.24	0.24	0.24	0.37
CEND23	0.55	0.53	0.51	0.49	0.93	0.51	0.47	0.49	0.51	0.56
CEND24	0.97	0.97	0.97	0.97	2.02	0.03	0.03	0.03	0.03	0.04
CEND25	0.84	0.83	0.82	0.80	1.48	0.20	0.17	0.18	0.20	0.30
CEND26	1.00	1.00	1.00	0.99	2.07	0.01	0.00	0.00	0.01	0.01
CEND29	0.81	0.81	0.81	0.81	0.89	0.19	0.19	0.19	0.19	0.58
CEND32	0.94	0.94	0.93	0.93	1.72	0.07	0.06	0.07	0.07	0.18
CEND33	0.94	0.93	0.93	0.93	1.87	0.07	0.07	0.07	0.07	0.11
CEND34	0.92	0.91	0.90	0.90	1.68	0.10	0.09	0.10	0.10	0.20

Complied by the author based on GRI indicators report.

Table 5

Variables	Obs	Mean	Std. Dev	Min	Max
CEND	1050	15.5968	13.3467	2.6666	84.6666
En Award	1050	.2066	.4051	0	1
ENSen	1050	.971	.168	0	1
ISO 14001	1050	.3447	.4051	0	1
SDG 13	1050	.0742	.2623	0	1
ROA	1050	5.5071	43.7519	-22.1626	1397.379
ROE	1050	10.0806	79.7792	-2167.692	758.9586
Age	1050	43.6190	17.8372	4	108
Size	1050	3.7966	.8513	1.56	8.89

Source: Authors' calculations based on the data collected from the company’s annual reports and The Pakistan Stock Exchange.

Table 6 Empirical findings

Multiple Regression analysis—System GMM with xtdpdsys

DV	CEND
IVs	Coefficients	Std.Error	P values
Lag CEND	.9434***	.0422	0.000
EAW	-.9072***	.2629	0.002
ENSen	2.6577*	1.601916	0.097
ISO14001	4.4321***	1.0176	0.000
SDG 13	2.1831**	.6542	0.001
ROA	-.0022	.0021	0.300
ROE	-.0012	.0011	0.296
age	.3314***	.0406	0.000
size	-.4753	.3240	0.142
Sargan test	10.5		0.411
AR (1)			0.006
AR (2)			0.332

Notes: ***, **, * represent significance at 1%, 5% and 10% levels respectively

CEND = Corporate environmental disclosure, ENAW = environmental award, ENSen = environmental sensitivity, SDGs = sustainable development goals, ROA = return on assets, ROE = return on equity, Age = manufacturing firm age, Size = firm size. Sargan test suggests the issue of over-identifying restrictions. AR (1) and AR (2) are applied to test first-order and second-order autocorrelation.

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Exploring a Nexus among Voluntary Environmental Sustainability Disclosure, ISO Certifications and Award, Sustainable Development Goals and Firm Performance

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2.1 Environmental disclosure reporting

2.6 Environmental Disclosure and Industry Sensitivity

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