A influência de setores de alto potencial poluidor e com histórico de infrações ambientais na evidenciação ambiental corporativa

Abstract

This dissertation aims to explain the influence of sectors of high polluting potential and with a history of environmental infractions in corporate environmental evidence. To this end, the Financial Statements and Sustainability Reports for the period 2017 to 2019 of the publicly held companies listed in the B3 Broad Brazil Index (IBrA) were examined. The research is described as applied, descriptive, explanatory, documentary and quali-quantitative. From the content analysis of 225 (two hundred and twenty-five) Sustainability Reports published by 78 (seventy-eight) companies, which make up the study sample, and based on the conceptual structure of Rover et al. (2012), it was possible to identify that most of the environmental information disclosed in the reports refers to information on environmental policy, followed by information on the impacts of products and processes on the environment and environmental financial information and that the least evidenced categories refer to environmental education and research and on carbon credit market. On average, 68.2% of the companies released a sustainability report in the period, of which 92% adopted some international methodology in its preparation. The average level of environmental evidence was 29.03% in 2017; 30.26% in 2018 and 30.41% in 2019 and the basic materials and oil, gas and biofuel sectors showed higher average levels of environmental evidence. To respond to the research problem, two research hypotheses were proposed that state that companies that perform activities with high polluting potential (H1) and with a history of environmental infractions (H2) have higher levels of environmental evidence. The regression model with panel data with random effects showed that the variables size, sector and history positively influenced environmental evidence at a significance level of 1%, not rejecting the research hypotheses, and that the variables indebtedness, profitability, audit and board size did not present significant influence.