Factors Affecting to ECMA Application in Vietnamese Brick Manufacturing Enterprises

Abstract

Production activities of Vietnamese brick enterprises creat negative impacts on the environment. In additon, the government's environmental regulations and social needs for sustainable development led to significant increases in environmental costs such as costs of treating wastes, costs of polluted management and prevention. Therefore, brick manufacturing enterprises should collect, analyze and report environmental costs for managing and controlling them. Environmental Cost Management Accounting (ECMA) becomes a useful tool to meet the above requirements. The paper focuses on researching factors that influence the application of ECMA in brick enterprises in Vietnam. The author presents four basis theories to construct seven hypotheses about the factors impacting on the application of ECMA including contigency theory, institutional theory, legitimacy theory, and stakeholder theory. The study uses quantitative methods to explore influence factors. Results of quantitative research show that four factors including government coercion pressure, normative pressure, community pressure, and positive environment strategy have positive relationships with the level of ECMA application. Derived from factors, the study provides some recommendations on brick enterprises, the government and community to increase the application of ECMA.

Keywords: Environmental management accounting (EMA), Environmental cost management accounting (ECMA), Environmental cost, Brick manufacturing enterprise