Female Directors' Expertise in the Audit Committee and Corporate Environmental Disclosure. Evidence from Listed Non-Financial Firms in Kenya
Loading...
Date
2024-11-30
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
African Journal of Accounting and Social Science Studies (AJASSS)
Abstract
This study examines the influence of female directors' expertise in the audit
committee and corporate environmental disclosure (CED) of listed non-financial
firms in the Nairobi Securities Exchange (NSE). Despite growing interest in
gender diversity in corporate governance, existing empirical research in Kenya
has largely overlooked the specific impact of female audit committee members’
professional expertise, particularly in accounting and finance, on CED.
Addressing this gap, the study focuses on two key variables: female audit
committee members with accounting/finance backgrounds and those without.
Guided by agency theory, resource dependency theory, and stakeholder theory,
the study utilized a content analysis approach to manually review and code
annual reports of 20 listed non-financial firms from 2016 to 2023, resulting in a
balanced panel of 160 firm-year observations. Fixed effect panel regression was
used to test the hypotheses, while the Generalized Methods of Moments (GMM)
was used to test for robustness. The results revealed that female audit committee
members with accounting and finance expertise significantly influenced CED. In
contrast, female non-accounting and finance experts in the audit committee
exerted a negative and significant influence on CED. The study concludes that
accounting and finance expertise among female directors in the audit committee
is a key determinant of CED among listed non-financial firms in Kenya. The study
recommends that listed non-financial firms should promote gender diversity by
appointing females with relevant expertise to audit committees. It also urges
policymakers to issue guidelines that emphasize both gender representation and
professional competence to enhance CED in emerging economies like Kenya.
Description
Keywords
Gender diversity, accounting and financial experts, non-accounting and financial experts, audit committee, Corporate environmental disclosure