Title: Sustainability reporting: a systematic literature review and analysis

Authors: Shyamal Datta; Sonu Goyal

Addresses: International Management Institute New Delhi, B-10, Qutab Institutional Area, New Delhi, Delhi 110016, India ' International Management Institute New Delhi, B-10, Qutab Institutional Area, New Delhi, Delhi 110016, India

Abstract: Adoption of sustainability reporting (SR) is growing consistently and 96% of the world's largest 250 companies now report on sustainability, leading to an increased research interest in this topic. However, studies on SR for identifying major themes, prominent authors, journals and countries are limited in number. Our study conducts a systematic literature analysis to structure the extant literature on sustainability reporting and provides an orientation for the researchers as well as industry experts. Findings show that Journal of Cleaner Production, Sustainability and Journal of Business Ethics are the most contributing journals while Australia, England and the USA are the leading countries. Olivier Boiral is the most productive author in terms of publishing articles and Rodrigo Lozano is the most cited author. GRI, CSR, assurance, stakeholder engagement are the most prominent themes while SDGs, firm performance, quality and materiality are the recent trends in sustainability reporting research area. We have also identified the research contexts (theories, determinants, industries) of current SR literature and suggested future research themes accordingly.

Keywords: sustainability reporting; sustainability accounting; non-financial reporting; bibliometric analysis; literature review; VOSViewer; Web of Science; corporate sustainability.

DOI: 10.1504/IJICBM.2024.140097

International Journal of Indian Culture and Business Management, 2024 Vol.32 No.3, pp.312 - 329

Received: 26 Jan 2023
Accepted: 02 Feb 2023
Published online: 24 Jul 2024 *

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