Description:
This study empirically assesses the disclosure of nonfinancial information in corporate reporting. In examining the contents of annual and board reports for 50 listed corporations, a coding sheet was developed by combining the two coding sheets of Boshnak and the European Directive 2014/95/EU. All corporations in three sectors-energy, utilities, and materials, which collectively represents 85.51% of the Saudi market capitalization-encompass the sample. Results reveal that employees, community, and products and services information have a moderate disclosure level. In contrast, environmental, customers, and fighting corruption have a low level. The findings also show that nonfinancial disclosure of the selected sectors on average range between 28.85% for the corporations in the material sector to 39.22% for the corporations in utilities sector. The corporations in the energy sector scored, on average, 37.65%. The mean for the entire sample of the ratios of disclosed nonfinancial items is 30.35%. However, the average disclosure level is without substantial improvement since 2012 and 2013, as previously reported The Capital Market Authority (CMA) is recommended to mandate nonfinancial information disclosure. It is a step toward realization aspects of Saudi Vision 2030 concerning with, for instance, protecting environment and other related matters.