Research Article
Sustainability Issues and Their Changes in the Last 10 Years from Materiality Analysis in Sustainability Reports
1 Hanyang University
Published: January 2022 · Vol. 26, No. 1 · pp. 125-148
DOI: https://doi.org/10.17287/kbr.2022.26.1.125
Full Text
Abstract
Previous studies on firm sustainability offer little insight into how firms and their stakeholders engage in sustainable management. The aim of this paper is to investigate how firms respond to all stakeholders’ demands and address their sustainability issues from materiality analysis in sustainability reports in 2010 and 2020. We find that 1,157 key issues can be divided into 14 issues, which are composed of economic, social, environmental, and governance parts. Also, this study indicates that firms who engage in ESG management make efforts to meet the expectations of their stakeholders and to deal effectively with sustainability issues. Thus, we expect that firms who are still concerned about sustainable management are urged to regard the importance of sustainable management and its reporting. This study contributes to the literature on firm sustainability and its reports. We present the limitations and future research for an empirical study on sustainability issues.
