Environmental accounting: the Portuguese case

Argues that the quality of the environment, and of course of human and non‐human life, depends on everybody's behaviour (men and companies). Laws are needed but above all it is essential that nature conservation is everybody's goal – governments, companies and anonymous citizens. In companies it is the administration's duty to make decisions and it is accounting's duty to present relevant information about patrimonial realities that help in the decision‐making process of every user. Does accounting have the duty to reveal what is being done with the natural resources? Yes. Aims to find out what Portuguese companies have been doing about this matter. The annual reports and accounts, from 1997 to 2001, of a group of ten Portuguese companies representative of their industrial sectors, were scrutinised. The companies were chosen because of their undoubted environmental impacts. All were asked: are they presenting environmental information? Where is this information presented ? What kind of information is being presented? How are they presenting it?