Board Characteristics, Country of Origin, and the Decision to Participate in the CDP’s Water Programme

Department of Accounting, Universiti Tenaga Nasional, Sultan Haji Ahmad Shah Campus, 26700 Muadzam Shah, Pahang, Malaysia

^* Corresponding author’ email: Bakhtiar@uniten.edu.my

Abstract

This study examines the propensity of the world’s largest companies to participate in the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) water programme. Drawing upon stakeholder theory, we assess the influence of board characteristics and country of origin on the decision of 748 largest companies from 42 countries to respond to the 2015 CDP water programme. Based on the binary logistic regression, we found that companies which participated in the survey have boards dominated by the independent directors, no specific environmental committee, and were domiciled in countries which placed greater emphasis on the information needs of the shareholders. We also found the evidence of companies operating in high water intensive industries to be more inclined towards participating in the survey. The findings provide tentative evidence to support the arguments of stakeholder theory.