SCI

You will recall that SCI measures the number of answers as a proportion of the total possible. This presents a picture not of relative disclosure, such as SQNI (the best company is 1, the worst company is 0), but of actual disclosure (1 is all questions or categories covered, 0 is no questions or categories covered). This metric is presented in two ways, firstly, the number of questions answered (a proportion of 26), and secondly, the number of categories where at least one question was addressed (a proportion of 6). Table 5 shows that the mean of SCI-question-based for the entire period is 0.31, while the highest score is 0.69 and the lowest is 0.04. For SCI-category-based, the highest score was 1, a company addressing all categories in an annual report, and the lowest at 0, no categories, and therefore, no questions addressed.

Table 6 also shows the question-based and category-based measures of the sample for the SCI metric. Answering one question would give a score of 1/26 for SCI-Q, but a score of 1/6 for SCI-C as one of the six categories would have been addressed; hence, SCI-C will always be higher. The minimum scores in Table 5 in both versions of the metric represent just one question or category being addressed; the maximum implies that, at best, 18 of the 26 questions were answered, though SCI-C tells us that on the best occasions, all categories were covered. The mean value of SCI-C suggests that, on average, just over half the categories were addressed, but SCI-Q shows that around a third of the questions were the mean proportion of questions tackled.

Table 6 shows that the company with the highest mean value of SCI-Q is Polymetal with 0.50, followed by Fresnillo with a score of 0.41, and the lowest is Glencore with 0.19, closely followed by Rio Tinto and Shell. SCI-C also has Polymetal as the highest reporter with a score of 0.81, with Evraz in second place with 0.72. Glencore and Shell tie on 0.39 for the lowest mean number of questions answered, followed by Rio Tinto. Polymetal and Evraz joined the FTSE100 part way through the sample period, which probably enhances their average, as the descriptive statistics show generally higher word count and questions answered in later years. There appears to be some consistency between SCI-Q and SCI-C in assessing the highest and lowest reporters.

Figures 3 and 4 both tell a visual story of rising questions and categories tackled with a visual jump for some companies in 2010/2011. However, this is not true of all companies, with Rio Tinto being close to the bottom of the graph at all times, whilst Glencore shows a dramatic improvement in reporting breadth in the last three years. The volatility of questions and categories tackled by each company shows that there is, it seems, a reconsideration of what to report in many years, with increased reporting sometimes followed by a reduction, which is perhaps a little surprising. One might have assumed that once a company had begun answering a question, then it would continue to do so. Figure 5 compares the average corporate score for each year for the two methods of calculation; both show a rising trend though not consistently.

**Figure 3.** SCI-question-based by company for each sample year.

**Figure 4.** SCI-category-based by company for each sample year.

4.2.2. Statistical Results of Multi-Dimensional Measures for UK Extractive Companies

The discussion now moves on to the more complex measures that seek to combine more than one dimension of "quality." ACHI will be considered first, then SHI, and finally TQLI. Again, three tables are presented of the overall and detailed scores for these three metrics. Table 7 gives the overall statistics across the sample; Table 8 the overall statistics for the individual companies over the sample period; and Table 9 the year-by-year scores for the companies.


**Table 7.** Mean values of the multi-dimensional metrics of disclosure.

Note. TQLI: total quality index, ACHI: [34] Index, SHI: [32] Index.

**Table 8.** Descriptive statistics: Multi-dimensional metrics for the entire sample across years.



**Table 9.** Summary of results of multi-dimensional metrics for the entire sample across years.

Corporate Anti-Corruption Disclosure Findings (ACHI)

You will recall that ACHI measures the average depth of answers to the questions that the company has addressed in its report. The disclosure relating to a particular question is assessed as 3 to 1, with quantitative and detailed information again being rated more highly than qualitative and broad disclosure. Whilst this metric may tell us about the depth of the questions addressed, it will tell us nothing about the proportion of questions that were addressed. One question addressed well will lead to a metric of 3, whereas all 26 questions addressed with just broad statements would score 1, or 25 questions addressed at level 3 will only lead to 2.88. Hence this is similar to SHI but has a maximum question score of 3 rather than 4 and only reports on answered questions.

Table 8 shows Fresnillo with the lowest average score for ACHI and BP the highest at 2.11. This can be interpreted as BP generally answering questions that it chooses to address with some depth, whereas Rio Tinto, on average, answers with less quantitative and less clear content. Table 9 shows a maximum of 3.0, which is Antofagasta in 2004, where one question was answered well. The mean score for a company's annual disclosure is 1.94, which we will see is significantly higher than the SHI average as the divisor here is just questions answered rather than total questions.

Figure 6 gives ACHI scores by the company over time. It is clear that there is no overall trend to greater depth or a company that consistently outperforms or underperforms compared to its peers. BP has the highest average of 2.11 whilst Fresnillo has the lowest average of 1.68. Table 9 shows no clear trend as the scores for each company are considered by year, and this is confirmed by Figure 7, which shows no rising trend and perhaps even a declining one over time. Figure 7 also shows the average number of questions answered by year, a clearly rising trend, yet ACHI does not reflect this.

**Figure 6.** ACHI scores by company by year.

It may be interesting to note the differences in the results of ACHI from previous studies, even though they have focused on environmental issues and used different samples. As noted above, the mean value of ACHI for this entire sample is 1.94; this is higher than [34] mean value of ACHI among 198 US non-financial firms for the 1994 fiscal year, which was about 0.67. The authors suggest that on a scale of 0 to 3, where 3 represents quantitative disclosure of all significant environmental activities, on average, their sample firms disclosed only qualitative information at best. This study found that companies disclosed specific qualitative information, in line with [30], where the mean was about 2.8, higher than that of [34]. The level of these scores may be linked to the timing of the profile raising of the issues concerned, with anti-corruption disclosure calls from the UN (UN, 2003) and others having a series of legal and non-legal interventions from the early 2000s.

**Figure 7.** A comparison of the average ACHI score by year with the average number of questions answered by year.

#### Corporate Anti-Corruption Disclosure Findings (SHI)

SHI seeks to assess the depth and breadth of corporate response. Each question is assessed on a scale of 0–4, with 0 being no coverage and 4 being very high-level coverage. The SHI scores quantitative disclosure scores higher than qualitative. The sum of the scores across the questions is then divided by the total answered question count, meaning a minimum score of 0 would imply no questions have been answered, and a maximum score of 4 would mean every question answered had been answered well. From a total score of 2, it would be impossible to separate the company that had answered every question in a manner that was marked a 2 from a company that had only answered half the questions but had also scored a two on each of them.

Table 7 shows that the maximum score is 1.73 for SHI, with the mean being 0.60. Table 8 shows Glencore to be the lowest reporter of this metric over the sample period registering just 0.37, with Polymetal top on 0.94. Table 9 shows the scores by the company over time, and an overall rising trend is confirmed by Figure 8. However, as with previous measures, there are laggards as well as some years where companies decide to reduce their reporting of anti-corruption details. Nevertheless, Figure 9 shows a rising, if inconsistent, trend of the average score over time with 2010, the date of the UK corruption act, coinciding with a rise in disclosure, although there is a further greater rise in 2017.

In the study by [32] of environmental issues with a sample of 32 New Zealand companies for the fiscal year 2010–2011, their reported mean value of SHI was 0.681, which is broadly comparable with the average shown in this study (Table 7).

**Figure 8.** SHI company trends over time.

**Figure 9.** SHI average disclosure trend over time.
