Conventional management accounting practices do not provide adequate information for managing the environment in a world where environmental concerns, as well as environment-related costs, revenues, and benefits, are on the rise. Environmental management accounting (EMA) is a tool used for balancing the interaction between the economic, social and technological factors in the development process to achieve conditions for sustainable development. In this study, a survey and case study technique is used to document a South African perspective on EMA. The findings indicate that, while EMA is gaining increasing awareness, its application is still at its infancy. Some of the elements of EMA may be found in practice, but they are not called EMA. Based on the findings, ten steps for implementing EMA are suggested.

This research explores whether Environmental Management Accounting can be applied to assist an Australian cogeneration company in improving both its financial performance as well as its environmental performance. Cogeneration or 'combined heat and power', in this particular case, involves the simultaneous production of heat and electricity using a single fuel, that is, natural gas. The heat generated is then used to produce steam to meet the customers' requirements as well as boost the production of electricity. Therefore, cogeneration provides greater efficiencies compared to traditional electricity generation methods because it utilizes heat that would otherwise be wasted. In addition, greenhouse gases emissions can be reduced substantially. The approach taken in this research is to assess whether an improvement in the energy efficiency of the cogeneration plant can lead to a reduction in greenhouse gases emissions. An improvement in energy efficiency means that either: • less gas is consumed, thus leading to cost savings; or • more electricity is generated for the same quantity of gas consumed, which leads to an increase in income and consequently profit. Therefore, an improvement in energy efficiency means an improvement in the financial performance. In addition, a reduction in the quantity of gas consumed or generating as much electricity as possible from a given quantity of gas can lead to a reduction in greenhouse gases emissions which means an improvement in the company's environmental performance. A case study method, which involves an Australian cogeneration company, is adopted because this would provide valuable in-depth practical insight into the operations and mechanisms of a company that is involved in combined heat and power generation. A review of the literature and the evidence collected indicated that a cogeneration plant's efficiency can be improved at least back to near the plant's designed efficiency. And, further improvements may be achieved by utilizing the latest technology although this involves capital investment. It is also established that an improvement in plant efficiency can reduce greenhouse gases emissions. This research then concludes that Environmental Management Accounting can help the case study company improve its financial and environmental performances. An Environmental Management Accounting system can provide the physical information that is not available in the existing management accounting system. Physical information such as the physical quantities of gas consumed, electricity and steam produced, and greenhouse gases emitted, can help the company in decision-making relating to improving plant efficiency as well as reducing greenhouse gases emissions.

The extraction of raw materials has environmental impacts. Forestry and the extraction of coal, oil, natural gas, gold and other minerals can have serious impacts on the environment. Exploration and evaluation, development activities, production and mine closure result in high costs. The years of waiting between the start of exploration, commencement of production and mine closure create specific challenges in accounting for mining organisations. Most of the damages caused by mining activities cannot be hidden because of the processes involved, it is best to prevent it rather than avoidance. It is important to implement Environmental Management Accounting (EMA), which will assist in presenting a decision-making system for corporations. The system measures and promotes environmental performance by identifying effective cost assessment structures. This study assessed the awareness of environmental management accounting in the mining industry. An analytical methodology was used. A questionnaire was administered to a selected group of participants. It was based on the employee’s understanding of their organisation’s practices or point of view on environmental issues to build a case about the awareness of environmental management accounting. Selected participants were mine management or mine production personnel, financial practitioners and environmental practitioners from different mining organisations in the Gauteng, Mpumalanga and North-West provinces of the Republic of South Africa. All participants in the study are employees in the mining industry. Mine management is less aware of environmental management accounting compared to environmental and financial practitioners. Mine production personnel only perceive environmental issues as costs to the operations. This group rated compliance with regulation as the main driver for their organisation’s environmental management system. Gauteng province is more aware of environmental management accounting compared to Mpumalanga and North West provinces. Organisations with high annual turnover tend to disclose more financial environmental information than those with low annual turnover. Organisations explain and classify environment-related costs differently according to the intended use of the cost information. There are standards and measures to collect and record environmental and accounting information stipulated in ISO14001 including environmental management systems (EMS) in different organisations. Systems and measures put in place ensure good environmental performance in the mining operations. The tracking and reduction in the amount of energy, water and materials used by organisations may result in environmental benefits. Employees should have environmental cost information associated with their operations in order to minimise environmental impacts of an organisation. The findings of the study indicated low levels of awareness of environmental management accounting in the mining industry; however, there is a higher level of awareness of environmental impacts and costs, environmental management system and financial environmental information. The level of rating at which organisations generate and record physical and monetary information of environmental management accounting is higher. / MBAm, North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2014

The extraction of raw materials has environmental impacts. Forestry and the extraction of coal, oil, natural gas, gold and other minerals can have serious impacts on the environment. Exploration and evaluation, development activities, production and mine closure result in high costs. The years of waiting between the start of exploration, commencement of production and mine closure create specific challenges in accounting for mining organisations. Most of the damages caused by mining activities cannot be hidden because of the processes involved, it is best to prevent it rather than avoidance. It is important to implement Environmental Management Accounting (EMA), which will assist in presenting a decision-making system for corporations. The system measures and promotes environmental performance by identifying effective cost assessment structures. This study assessed the awareness of environmental management accounting in the mining industry. An analytical methodology was used. A questionnaire was administered to a selected group of participants. It was based on the employee’s understanding of their organisation’s practices or point of view on environmental issues to build a case about the awareness of environmental management accounting. Selected participants were mine management or mine production personnel, financial practitioners and environmental practitioners from different mining organisations in the Gauteng, Mpumalanga and North-West provinces of the Republic of South Africa. All participants in the study are employees in the mining industry. Mine management is less aware of environmental management accounting compared to environmental and financial practitioners. Mine production personnel only perceive environmental issues as costs to the operations. This group rated compliance with regulation as the main driver for their organisation’s environmental management system. Gauteng province is more aware of environmental management accounting compared to Mpumalanga and North West provinces. Organisations with high annual turnover tend to disclose more financial environmental information than those with low annual turnover. Organisations explain and classify environment-related costs differently according to the intended use of the cost information. There are standards and measures to collect and record environmental and accounting information stipulated in ISO14001 including environmental management systems (EMS) in different organisations. Systems and measures put in place ensure good environmental performance in the mining operations. The tracking and reduction in the amount of energy, water and materials used by organisations may result in environmental benefits. Employees should have environmental cost information associated with their operations in order to minimise environmental impacts of an organisation. The findings of the study indicated low levels of awareness of environmental management accounting in the mining industry; however, there is a higher level of awareness of environmental impacts and costs, environmental management system and financial environmental information. The level of rating at which organisations generate and record physical and monetary information of environmental management accounting is higher. / MBAm, North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2014

Environmental issues are of increasing concern to citizens, governmental personnel and corporate leaders in most countries all around the world. There is a growing consensus that conventional accounting practices simply do not provide adequate information to support decisionmaking in environmental management. Simply defined, environmental management accounting is management accounting with a focus on physical information on the flow of energy, water, products and materials as well as monetary information on environmental costs and revenues, and projects related to environmental protection. It is not a different method, but simply a mechanism of doing management accounting in an improved manner. When environmental management accounting is well designed and implement it should ensure better internal management and value-added decisionmaking. Ultimately, environmental management accounting is simply doing better comprehensive management accounting while wearing an environmental hat. This study evaluates the awareness of environmental management accounting in the chemical industry. A questionnaire was administrated to a selected group of par-ticipants. All participants in the study are employees from the chemical industry in South Africa. The selection of participants was based on their knowledge, expertise and understanding of environmental practices, challenges and problems in their respective organisations. Different functional roles from different types of chemical companies were identified to participate. The findings of this study indicated that there is a good level of awareness of environ-mental management accounting in the South African chemical industry. Most orga-nisations are applying sound environmental practices and are adopting environ-mental strategies and different tools to improve their current status. Different levels of awareness exist between different types of chemical industries and between different functional roles in the respective organisations. Operational and capital environ-mental information are disclosed and organisations do generate and record information on physical and monetary environmental management accounting. / MBA, North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2015

Environmental issues are an increasing concern for various stakeholders in the mining industry. To address these concerns, managements of mining companies should embrace sustainable mining practices in their daily decision making processes. Internal decision making processes are strongly dependent on the quality of data included in reports used by management. Currently environmental issues are only considered as a separate item which is attached to the annual financial statements. No link is made between the environmental performance of the mine and the economic performance that is achieved. To achieve greater acknowledgement by management of the importance of controlling environmental costs on a daily basis, environmental costs need to be identifiable in internal management reports, including management accounting reports. Various methods are available with which the value of environmental inputs and outputs can accurately be determined. If these values are correctly integrated into information systems, reporting these environmental costs will be possible, allowing a mining company to consider triple-bottom-line reporting. The goal of this study is to assist mining companies, specifically platinum mining, in measuring and reporting on environmental costs by setting up a framework. This framework will be formulated by means of conducting a thorough study of the recent and current literature pertaining to the measurement methods of environmental costs upon which a comparison will be drawn between this theory and the actual measurement and reporting of environmental costs by means of case study research. A gap analysis has identified the problems that platinum mines are experiencing, and consequently, the framework created will assist platinum mines in introducing the reporting of environmental costs. A case study on a platinum mine was done in order to evaluate the current measurement methods and reporting on environmental costs. The collected data was analysed through explanation building and an organisational-level logic model was developed in order to understand the reasons that costs are recorded and reported on by using the method currently applied in the case study principal. This organisational-level logic model will assist in identifying problems within the current costing method in relation to environmental cost measurement and reporting. The findings identified by the case study were compared to the theory underlying environmental management accounting after which a gap analysis identified the problems that platinum mines experience. Based on the findings of the gap analysis, a framework was developed to assist platinum mines in closing the gap that has been identified. The framework, if applied within an organisation will assist mining companies in expanding their current reporting on environmental issues to an in-depth review of environmental impacts which can be linked to the achievement of economic performance. This will allow a step forward in triplebottom- line reporting as the value of environmental costs has been identified as the missing link in current financial reports. The framework could not be tested as the application of the framework requires a procedural change within the organisation which needs to be approved at top management level. This limitation does, however, open the possibility for a follow up study. Additional reporting on environmental costs will help management in adding value and quality to daily and overall decision making processes. This hypothesis can be tested in possible future studies which involve multiple-case studies and which will extend the framework to include a decision making matrix. / MCom (Management Accountancy), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2014

Environmental issues are of increasing concern to citizens, governmental personnel and corporate leaders in most countries all around the world. There is a growing consensus that conventional accounting practices simply do not provide adequate information to support decisionmaking in environmental management. Simply defined, environmental management accounting is management accounting with a focus on physical information on the flow of energy, water, products and materials as well as monetary information on environmental costs and revenues, and projects related to environmental protection. It is not a different method, but simply a mechanism of doing management accounting in an improved manner. When environmental management accounting is well designed and implement it should ensure better internal management and value-added decisionmaking. Ultimately, environmental management accounting is simply doing better comprehensive management accounting while wearing an environmental hat. This study evaluates the awareness of environmental management accounting in the chemical industry. A questionnaire was administrated to a selected group of par-ticipants. All participants in the study are employees from the chemical industry in South Africa. The selection of participants was based on their knowledge, expertise and understanding of environmental practices, challenges and problems in their respective organisations. Different functional roles from different types of chemical companies were identified to participate. The findings of this study indicated that there is a good level of awareness of environ-mental management accounting in the South African chemical industry. Most orga-nisations are applying sound environmental practices and are adopting environ-mental strategies and different tools to improve their current status. Different levels of awareness exist between different types of chemical industries and between different functional roles in the respective organisations. Operational and capital environ-mental information are disclosed and organisations do generate and record information on physical and monetary environmental management accounting. / MBA, North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2015

Environmental issues are an increasing concern for various stakeholders in the mining industry. To address these concerns, managements of mining companies should embrace sustainable mining practices in their daily decision making processes. Internal decision making processes are strongly dependent on the quality of data included in reports used by management. Currently environmental issues are only considered as a separate item which is attached to the annual financial statements. No link is made between the environmental performance of the mine and the economic performance that is achieved. To achieve greater acknowledgement by management of the importance of controlling environmental costs on a daily basis, environmental costs need to be identifiable in internal management reports, including management accounting reports. Various methods are available with which the value of environmental inputs and outputs can accurately be determined. If these values are correctly integrated into information systems, reporting these environmental costs will be possible, allowing a mining company to consider triple-bottom-line reporting. The goal of this study is to assist mining companies, specifically platinum mining, in measuring and reporting on environmental costs by setting up a framework. This framework will be formulated by means of conducting a thorough study of the recent and current literature pertaining to the measurement methods of environmental costs upon which a comparison will be drawn between this theory and the actual measurement and reporting of environmental costs by means of case study research. A gap analysis has identified the problems that platinum mines are experiencing, and consequently, the framework created will assist platinum mines in introducing the reporting of environmental costs. A case study on a platinum mine was done in order to evaluate the current measurement methods and reporting on environmental costs. The collected data was analysed through explanation building and an organisational-level logic model was developed in order to understand the reasons that costs are recorded and reported on by using the method currently applied in the case study principal. This organisational-level logic model will assist in identifying problems within the current costing method in relation to environmental cost measurement and reporting. The findings identified by the case study were compared to the theory underlying environmental management accounting after which a gap analysis identified the problems that platinum mines experience. Based on the findings of the gap analysis, a framework was developed to assist platinum mines in closing the gap that has been identified. The framework, if applied within an organisation will assist mining companies in expanding their current reporting on environmental issues to an in-depth review of environmental impacts which can be linked to the achievement of economic performance. This will allow a step forward in triplebottom- line reporting as the value of environmental costs has been identified as the missing link in current financial reports. The framework could not be tested as the application of the framework requires a procedural change within the organisation which needs to be approved at top management level. This limitation does, however, open the possibility for a follow up study. Additional reporting on environmental costs will help management in adding value and quality to daily and overall decision making processes. This hypothesis can be tested in possible future studies which involve multiple-case studies and which will extend the framework to include a decision making matrix. / MCom (Management Accountancy), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2014

Desenvolvimento Sustentável, Responsabilidade Social Corporativa e Sustentabilidade Empresarial são conceitos que convergem para o mesmo objetivo: integrar os aspectos econômicos, sociais e ecológicos dos negócios. A eco-eficiência pode ser utilizada para integrar desempenho econômico e ecológico. Há no mercado divulgação de empresas que mantém ações que visam à proteção ambiental. No entanto, para contribuir para a sustentabilidade do negócio essas atividades devem convergir para a eco-eficiência. Para isso, a ação ecológica empresarial deve atuar sobre os resíduos emitidos pelas operações da própria empresa e os gastos nelas incorridos devem resultar em benefícios econômico-financeiros ao negócio. Nesse contexto, este estudo identifica a seguinte pergunta de pesquisa: em termos contábeis, como podem ser categorizadas as ações ecológicas empresariais para fornecer informações sobre eventos relacionados com a eco-eficiência do negócio? O objetivo desta dissertação é: categorizar as ações ecológicas empresariais visando o fornecimento de informações econômico-financeiras sobre eventos relacionados com a eco-eficiência do negócio. Este trabalho, por meio de um estudo de corte transversal, análise de conteúdo, pesquisa exploratória, descritiva, básica e indutiva, identifica 608 exemplos de ações ecológicas mantidas por empresas, das quais 450 atuam sobre elementos não relacionados com os próprios detritos por meio de programas de desenvolvimento sustentável, educação ambiental, reciclagem, preservação e recuperação; e 158 sobre os resíduos emitidos pela própria companhia durante o processamento de seus produtos e serviços em quatro direções: I. reduzir o consumo de insumos, substituir os não-renováveis por renováveis, reciclados ou retirados de forma ecológica; II. transformar resíduos em insumos; III. transformar resíduos em produtos; IV. promover a coleta seletiva de lixo, reduzir a emissão de resíduos, neutralizar o efeito tóxico dos resíduos e cumprir com obrigações contratuais. Há duas categorias para as ações ecológicas empresariais. As que podem aumentar a eco-eficiência do negócio ficam separadas dos programas voltados ao desenvolvimento sustentável da sociedade, mas externos ao negócio da empresa. Isso organiza os gastos e resultados incorridos nas ações ecológicas empresariais e gera informação sobre o caminho para a empresa integrar desempenho ecológico e econômico. O objetivo deste trabalho foi alcançado, pois identifica uma forma de organização capaz de favorecer o processo de fornecimento de informações sobre os fluxos monetário e físico envolvidos com inputs e outputs do sistema empresa e o efeito das ações ecológicas nesses fluxos. Esse tipo de informação é útil para os executivos da gestão ambiental administrarem a eco-eficiência do negócio e pode ser fornecida pelo subsistema da ciência contábil chamado de Contabilidade Ambiental ou Contabilidade da Gestão Ambiental. Por fim, a pesquisa resulta em um sistema de gestão da eco-eficiência empresarial e aponta caminhos para futuros estudos. / Sustainable Development, Corporative Social Responsibility and Enterprise Sustainability are concepts that converge the same to objective: to integrate the economic, social and ecological aspects of the businesses. The eco-efficiency can be used to integrate economic and ecological performance. It has in the market spreading of companies that keeps actions that aim at the environmental protection. However, to contribute for the sustainability of the business these activities they must converge to the eco-efficiency. For this, the enterprise ecological action must act on the residues emitted for the operations of the proper company and the expenses in incurred them must result in economic-financial benefits to the business. In this context, this study it identifies the following question of research: in accounting terms, how can be categorized the enterprise ecological actions to supply information on events related with the eco-efficiency of the business? The objective is: to categorize the enterprise ecological actions being aimed at the supply of information economic-financiers on events related with the eco-efficiency of the business. This dissertation, by means of study of transversal cut, content analysis, explorer, descriptive, basic and inductive research, identifies 608 examples of ecological actions kept by companies, of which 450 act on elements unrelated to the debris of the proper firm by means of programs of sustainable development, environmental education, recycling and preservation and recovery; and 158 act on the residues emitted for the proper company during of the processing of its products and services in four directions: I. to reduce the consumption of raw materials, to substitute not renewed them for renewed, recycled or removed of ecological form; II. to transform residues into raw materials; III. to transform residues into products; IV. to promote the garbage collection selective, to reduce the emission of residues, to neutralize the toxic effect of the residues or to fulfill with contractual obligations. It has two categories for the enterprise ecological actions. The ones that they can increase the eco-efficiency of the business are separate of the programs directed to sustainable development of the society, but external to business of the company. This organizes the expenses and results incurred into the enterprise ecological actions and generates information on the way it company to integrate ecological performance and economic. The objective of this work was reached, therefore it identifies a form of organization capable to favor the process of supply of information on the monetary and physical flow involved with inputs and outputs of the system company and on the effect of the ecological actions in these flows. This type of information is useful for the executives of the environmental management to manage the eco-efficiency of the business and can be supplied by the subsystem of accounting call of Environmental Accounting or Environmental Management Accounting. Finally, the research results in a enterprise eco-efficiency management system and points a way with respect to future studies.

Desenvolvimento Sustentável, Responsabilidade Social Corporativa e Sustentabilidade Empresarial são conceitos que convergem para o mesmo objetivo: integrar os aspectos econômicos, sociais e ecológicos dos negócios. A eco-eficiência pode ser utilizada para integrar desempenho econômico e ecológico. Há no mercado divulgação de empresas que mantém ações que visam à proteção ambiental. No entanto, para contribuir para a sustentabilidade do negócio essas atividades devem convergir para a eco-eficiência. Para isso, a ação ecológica empresarial deve atuar sobre os resíduos emitidos pelas operações da própria empresa e os gastos nelas incorridos devem resultar em benefícios econômico-financeiros ao negócio. Nesse contexto, este estudo identifica a seguinte pergunta de pesquisa: em termos contábeis, como podem ser categorizadas as ações ecológicas empresariais para fornecer informações sobre eventos relacionados com a eco-eficiência do negócio? O objetivo desta dissertação é: categorizar as ações ecológicas empresariais visando o fornecimento de informações econômico-financeiras sobre eventos relacionados com a eco-eficiência do negócio. Este trabalho, por meio de um estudo de corte transversal, análise de conteúdo, pesquisa exploratória, descritiva, básica e indutiva, identifica 608 exemplos de ações ecológicas mantidas por empresas, das quais 450 atuam sobre elementos não relacionados com os próprios detritos por meio de programas de desenvolvimento sustentável, educação ambiental, reciclagem, preservação e recuperação; e 158 sobre os resíduos emitidos pela própria companhia durante o processamento de seus produtos e serviços em quatro direções: I. reduzir o consumo de insumos, substituir os não-renováveis por renováveis, reciclados ou retirados de forma ecológica; II. transformar resíduos em insumos; III. transformar resíduos em produtos; IV. promover a coleta seletiva de lixo, reduzir a emissão de resíduos, neutralizar o efeito tóxico dos resíduos e cumprir com obrigações contratuais. Há duas categorias para as ações ecológicas empresariais. As que podem aumentar a eco-eficiência do negócio ficam separadas dos programas voltados ao desenvolvimento sustentável da sociedade, mas externos ao negócio da empresa. Isso organiza os gastos e resultados incorridos nas ações ecológicas empresariais e gera informação sobre o caminho para a empresa integrar desempenho ecológico e econômico. O objetivo deste trabalho foi alcançado, pois identifica uma forma de organização capaz de favorecer o processo de fornecimento de informações sobre os fluxos monetário e físico envolvidos com inputs e outputs do sistema empresa e o efeito das ações ecológicas nesses fluxos. Esse tipo de informação é útil para os executivos da gestão ambiental administrarem a eco-eficiência do negócio e pode ser fornecida pelo subsistema da ciência contábil chamado de Contabilidade Ambiental ou Contabilidade da Gestão Ambiental. Por fim, a pesquisa resulta em um sistema de gestão da eco-eficiência empresarial e aponta caminhos para futuros estudos. / Sustainable Development, Corporative Social Responsibility and Enterprise Sustainability are concepts that converge the same to objective: to integrate the economic, social and ecological aspects of the businesses. The eco-efficiency can be used to integrate economic and ecological performance. It has in the market spreading of companies that keeps actions that aim at the environmental protection. However, to contribute for the sustainability of the business these activities they must converge to the eco-efficiency. For this, the enterprise ecological action must act on the residues emitted for the operations of the proper company and the expenses in incurred them must result in economic-financial benefits to the business. In this context, this study it identifies the following question of research: in accounting terms, how can be categorized the enterprise ecological actions to supply information on events related with the eco-efficiency of the business? The objective is: to categorize the enterprise ecological actions being aimed at the supply of information economic-financiers on events related with the eco-efficiency of the business. This dissertation, by means of study of transversal cut, content analysis, explorer, descriptive, basic and inductive research, identifies 608 examples of ecological actions kept by companies, of which 450 act on elements unrelated to the debris of the proper firm by means of programs of sustainable development, environmental education, recycling and preservation and recovery; and 158 act on the residues emitted for the proper company during of the processing of its products and services in four directions: I. to reduce the consumption of raw materials, to substitute not renewed them for renewed, recycled or removed of ecological form; II. to transform residues into raw materials; III. to transform residues into products; IV. to promote the garbage collection selective, to reduce the emission of residues, to neutralize the toxic effect of the residues or to fulfill with contractual obligations. It has two categories for the enterprise ecological actions. The ones that they can increase the eco-efficiency of the business are separate of the programs directed to sustainable development of the society, but external to business of the company. This organizes the expenses and results incurred into the enterprise ecological actions and generates information on the way it company to integrate ecological performance and economic. The objective of this work was reached, therefore it identifies a form of organization capable to favor the process of supply of information on the monetary and physical flow involved with inputs and outputs of the system company and on the effect of the ecological actions in these flows. This type of information is useful for the executives of the environmental management to manage the eco-efficiency of the business and can be supplied by the subsystem of accounting call of Environmental Accounting or Environmental Management Accounting. Finally, the research results in a enterprise eco-efficiency management system and points a way with respect to future studies.