Climate Change Related Disclosure By Large Indian Companies - Pre and Post Business Responsibility Reporting and Paris Climate Accord

Abstract

There is an increasing concern on the carbon bubble in the stock market valuation of companies thosedepend on fossil fuel based energy production. When countries ratify the global climate agreement, theindustries which are the major contributors of climate change will be exposed to climate risk. EarthSummit of 1992 , Kyoto Protocol of 1997(effective from 2005 to 2020) and Paris agreement of 2015(effec tive from 2020) are the international agreements on climate change. Paris Agreement deals withgreenhouse gas emissions mitigation, adaptation and finance emphasizing on consensus building,voluntary and nationally determined targets. Corporate all over the world, including India arevoluntari ly committing to the targets set by Paris Agreement. In India, SEBI has mandated BusinessResponsibility Reporting as national level Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) reporting bycorporate from FY 2012-13. India, being the fourth largest emitter of Greenhouse gas, it is interestingto measure the level of corporate climate change disclosure by large Indian companies and whetherthey have improved after introduction of Paris Climate Accord and introduction of BRR. Hence , thisstudy measures the level of climate change disclosure by S&P Nifty 50 companies for 5 years from FY2009-10 to FY 2016-17 using content analysis. By using NVivo software, keywords were searchedfrom the contents of Annual Reports, Sustainability Reports & Integrated Reports. Using analysis ofvariance, this study found that there are significant company-wise, year-wise, sector-wise and category-wise (poll uting Vs. non-polluting) differences in the level of climate change disclosure by large Indiancompanies. It is also found that there is a significant improvement before and after the implementationof Business Responsibility Reporting and introduction of Paris Climate Accord.