Corporate Social responsibility Disclosure by Listed Companies in the Qatar Stock Exchange

Abstract

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to measure the extent of corporate social responsibility disclosure (CSRD) made by Qatar listed companies in the Qatar Stock Exchange on their annual reports, and to investigate the relationship between the company’s activity and the level of CSRD.Methodology: Using content analysis method, 93 annual reports of 31 listed companies examined for three consecutive years (2011-2013)Finding: The results in general showed that all Qatar listed companies have disclosed some of social information in different parts of their annual reports and levels of varying and growing during the years of the study, whilst the most frequently reported areas were Human resource , Community Involvement, Customer Service, Protection the Environment, and others respectively. The results also showed that all methods of social disclosure (financial and quantitative descriptive) was used by the companies to report CSR information and, although most of these information came in the form of descriptive with limited use of financial method. This study is sporting the early finding, which was there is significant difference between CSRD levels among different companies sectors.