Corporate Governance, Corporate Health Accounting and Firm Value: The Case of HIV/AIDS Disclosures in Sub-Saharan Africa

Abstract

Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) has the highest prevalence rate of HIV/AIDS in the world with negative effects on productivity, profitability, economic growth and development. The social responsibility role of public companies in contributing towards reducing the negative effects of HIV/AIDS is priceless. This paper investigates the impact of corporate governance (CG) on social and environmental accounting (SEA) with specific focus on corporate health accounting (CHA) and consequently, examines whether CG can moderate the link between CHA and firm value (FV) with particular focus on HIV/AIDS disclosures. First, employing one of the most extensive data on CG, CHA and FV from a sample of listed SSA companies to-date, our results suggest that companies that are better-governed tend to engage in increased CHA disclosures. Second, we find that the combined effect of CG and CHA on FV is stronger than CHA alone, meaning that the quality of firm-level CG moderates the link between CHA and FV. Our econometric specifications are robust to different traditional firm-level characteristics, endogeneities and alternative CG (corporate board and shareholding structure variables), FV and CHA proxies. We interpret our findings within a framework that attempts to combine Suchman’s (1995) legitimacy theoretical perspective with Ashforth and Gibbs’ (1990) substantive and symbolic legitimacy management strategies.

Keywords: Corporate Governance; Social and Environmental Accounting; Corporate Health Accounting; HID/AIDS; Firm Value; Legitimacy Theory – Substantive and Symbolic Management; Sub-Saharan Africa

JEL Classification: G34; M14; M41