Determinants of SDG Reporting by Businesses: A Literature Analysis and Conceptual Model

Abstract

Despite the increasing adoption of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by organizations since 2015, the literature on SDG disclosure is nascent and no significant effort has been made to collate the outcome of previous studies. In this study, the current state and determinants of SDG reporting have been identified from the literature. Our findings suggest that most studies focused only on large companies from developed countries. Also, there are three categories of determinants that impact SDG reporting. They are firm-level, report-level and regulation-level. Only report-level determinants are in the business’s control and firm and regulation-level determinants are not directly controlled by businesses. Our analysis summarizes key findings in the area of SDG reporting, as well as important theories and contexts used to explain SDG reporting-related phenomena. Finally, a conceptual framework has been proposed to explain the relationship between SDG reporting adoption and determining factors. As research interest is increasing in the SDG reporting area, researchers can benefit from this study while assessing the present state of SDG reporting and formulating future research directions. Industry practitioners can refer to this study for implementing SDG reporting as it helps them to identify relevant determinants.

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