Abstract
The relevance of the study is caused by the fact that the non-financial reporting of business entities and the intensification of process of globalization are becoming nowadays an important source of information for making managerial decisions by different groups of stakeholders. The process of its implementation, definition of types, forms and content remains legally unregulated for Ukraine. A process of its audit requires a systemic solution and an appropriate independent audit opinion.
The purpose of the article is to summarize the European and international experience in the field of regulation of drawing up and publication of non-financial reporting, to work out problems of its content definition and to provide proposals for the regulation of these issues in Ukraine, to define the recommended groups of indicators, and to ground the main directions and tasks of their audit.
It is proposed to create a general concept for the implementation and development of non-financial reporting in Ukraine, which may require the adoption of the future Law of Ukraine “On Public Non-Financial Reporting”, national standards for its preparation, and relevant methodological recommendations for their implementation. The directions of development of theoretical, organizational and methodical issues of audit of non-financial reporting are provided.
A number of valid normative acts of the Audit Chamber of Ukraine in terms of the regulation of audit of non-financial reporting and improvement of professional qualifications of specialists require clarification and accompaniments.
INTRODUCTION
The information needs of business and society in general (both in Ukraine and in the world) in conditions of globalization of the economy can no longer be satisfied only on the basis of the data contained in the financial statements. At the same time, economic entities are interested to inform the public of their social initiatives, corporate responsibility and other achievements that require a special format of presentation for formation of high rating, reputation and investment attractiveness. Currently, different groups of stakeholders are interested in the characteristics of economic activity, which are reflected with a significant set of non-financial indicators grouped according to certain types of non-financial reporting on the social, ecological and economic aspects of the business entities activities. The peculiarity of such non-financial reporting as far as their types, content, format and set of indicators choosing is a decision by the enterprise/company it- self (as a rule, by a large corporation, though recently small and medium enterprises have been joining to this process) and lack of clear legal regulation in Ukraine. An important problem is the auditors’ confirmation of the reliability and completeness of non-financial reporting in order to meet the information needs of their wide range of users at making managerial decisions.
