*4.2. Assessment of Vietnamese SDGs Adopters: Evaluation of Environmental Sensitive Industries Impact Level*

This analysis of the SDG disclosures of the Top 100 Vietnamese listed firms reveals a general trend toward the content of Vietnamese corporate reports across the sectors. Table 7 presents our mapping between industries categorized by the level of sensitive environmental factors and the adoption of 17 UN SDGs from 2015 to 2021. Overall, there is an increasing trend in the number of SDGs disclosed in the corporate reporting, for example, HESI: 291 to 585 times; MESI: 20 to 41 times; LESI: 87 to 163 times. Unsurprisingly, Panel A—High environmental sensitivity industries (HESI) accounts for the highest number of mentions regarding SDGs in the selected firms' corporate reporting compared to Panel B and Panel C year by year. This result is consistent with previous research findings [54,55], meaning that SDG-related information disclosed by corporations primarily depends on industry risk characteristics. However, with firms operating in the Low environmental sensitivity industries (LESI), Panel C revealed more SDG-related information in their reports compared to Panel B, with firms operating in the Medium environmental sensitivity industries (MESI). This result is consistent with the predictions derived from stakeholder theory that high-risk industries disclose more sustainability information to meet the stakeholders' expectations of enhancing CSR practices.


**Table 7.** Adoption of SDGs by Environmental Sensitive Industries Impact

 Level.

Next, as presented in Table 8, sectors are deeply interpreted as the level of adopting the 17 UN SDGs. Although Table 7 reveals that firms belonging to high environmental sensitivity industries have an impact on the way of reporting the SDGs information. Some HESI firms have not made a solid effort to follow the SDGs agenda. For instance, two HESI sectors: natural gas distribution and utilities, have weakly followed and committed to the UN SDGs, apart from SDG8 Decent Work and Economic Growth; suggesting that even operating in high-risk industries, the level of adoption is different from sector to another because of the business core model rather than capturing "the trend" to adopt the SDGs implementation in their reporting practice. Interestingly, our result indicates that LESI firms are intensely keen to disseminate their sustainability initiatives in their corporate reporting, despite the absence of stakeholders' pressure related to firms' legitimacy and transparency motivations. This finding is consistent with previous studies by [82,91], as they have no product-related risks to hide. These findings can be explained by legitimacy theory and voluntary disclosure theory; unsustainable performers intend to disclose less sustainabilityrelated information to conceal their actual performance for sustainable development and avoid damaging their legitimacy and reputation.
