Does board structure drive Sustainable Development Goals disclosure? Evidence from an emerging market

Abstract

The study investigates to which extent corporate board characteristics influence the disclosure of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in Omani-listed financial institutions. Using hand-collected data for 34 Omani financial institutions listed on the Muscat Stock Exchange for the period between 2016 and 2020, the study applies multivariate analysis to examine the association between corporate board characteristics and SDGs disclosure following Al Lawati and Hussainey’s (2022) method in measuring SDG variables. Drawing from agency theory and resource dependence theory, our results showed that the independence and financial expertise of the corporate board promote better disclosure of SDGs. On the other hand, gender and nationality diversity of the board were found to be negatively associated with the disclosure of the SDGs. Our paper contributes to the growing literature by being the first study to examine the extent to which corporate board characteristics drive SDGs disclosure in one of the emerging markets. In addition, in our study, we employ the resource dependence theory with the agency theory to investigate our research hypotheses in order to capture the full practice of the SDGs disclosure. The study implies that the characteristics of the corporate board are one of the main determinants of SDGs disclosure in emerging markets. Furthermore, not all boards behave the same with regard to the disclosure of the SDGs, and this behavior is determined by its characteristics. The study recommends that a sustainability committee may be initiated to enhance the disclosure of the SDGs in Omani financial institutions.