A stakeholders' view of environmental reporting

Abstract In practice, environmental reports can range from a simple public relations statement to a detailed and in-depth examination of the company's environmental performance, policies, practices and future direction. The central objective of any environmental report has to be to communicate the company's environmental performance to the report reader. This article is based on the assumption that the vast majority of existing environmental reports are unable to satisfy all of the information requirements of the target groups for which they are written. To try and rectify this situation the article first of all defines the different audiences, or ‘target groups’, of an environmental report. The authors have then consulted with key representatives of each of these target groups and identified the most important issues that they want to see presented in an environmental report. This information is summarized in tabular form, and from these findings the article proposes two separate reporting strategies which companies may pursue for a more effective environmental report: (1) they can produce a ‘generic report’ concentrating on the key points which all target groups accept as being of primary importance; or alternatively (2) they can produce ‘specialized’ environmental reports which address all of the requirements of a specific target group. It is the authors' intention in this article to provide companies with the information necessary to choose and then be able to undertake either of these scenarios.