Department of Accounting
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Item Exploring Sustainability Practices In The Ghanaian Petroleum Sector – Downstream Companies In Focus(University of Ghana, 2022-07) Johnfiah, R.A.The study examines the sustainability practices of downstream petroleum firms in Ghana. Particularly, the study explores the focus areas of their sustainability practices and the manner through which sustainability practices are operationalised. This research adapts elements of the institutional theory to interpret the outcome of a series of semi-structured interviews with members of selected downstream petroleum companies in Ghana, thus, the qualitative research approach is adopted for the study. Participants were drawn from downstream petroleum firms in Ghana using the purposive sampling technique. The results of the study show that the focus areas identified, with regards to downstream petroleum firms in Ghana, are paramount channels through which sustainability is practiced. The study also finds that these focus areas, in as much as are common across firms in the downstream sector in Ghana was found to be different among companies in the mid and upstream petroleum sector. The findings of this study suggest that sustainability practices amongst downstream petroleum firms in Ghana constitute an important objective. This paper contributes to the literature on sustainability practices amongst downstream petroleum companies in Ghana by building on earlier conceptualizations of the institutional theory to explore motivations for downstream petroleum firms to engage in sustainability practices.Item Climate Change Action And Reporting: The Role Of The Accounting Profession(University Of Ghana, 2021-12) Mbroh, M.The study explores the role of the accounting profession in climate change action and reporting. More specifically, the study examines what and how the accounting profession can influence climate change action and reporting. In doing so, Abbott’s theory on the systems of profession was adopted as a theoretical lens to guide the study. The qualitative case study approach was adopted where data was collected through semi-structured interviews. Data analysis was carried out using thematic analysis where data collected was condensed, displayed, and analysed for conclusions to be drawn. The study finds that the accounting profession has categorised climate change as an environmental issue. Within the accounting profession are structural and social actors who are engaging in intraprofessional and interprofessional relations to refine accounting knowledge systems that inform accounting professionals on climate change reporting. Also, the study finds other roles of the accounting profession such as creation of awareness of climate change by accounting professional bodies and provision of climate change reporting standards as prescriptions to contribute to climate action. The findings of the study provide practical implications for the accounting profession to modify traditional accounting practices and recommends that climate change action and reporting should be integrated into accounting pedagogy.Item Big Data And Decision Making Among Accountants In Multinational Companies In Ghana(University Of Ghana, 2021-06) Ntiamoah, P.Big data analytics is one of the reliable means of data management techniques used in most transnational corporations. In Ghana, there have been efforts by multinational companies to efficiently outsource, store, analyse and use big data for various decision-making protocols. However, accountants’ low level of expertise in data management techniques has resulted in several challenges in big accessing, analysing, and making empirical decisions with big data. This qualitative study employed the case study design while purposively sampling twelve respondents from multinational companies in Ghana to assess big data management techniques in multinational companies and the challenges that are associated with them. Data was elicited from respondents through face-to-face in-depth interviews with specially designed interview guide. Findings reported by the study revealed that, multinational companies in Ghana resort to the use of big data analytical systems such as Tableau, SAP, AQUILLA and EPC for data sourcing and storage. Moreover, it was revealed that accountants in multinational companies greatly depend on big data analytics for making various strategic, managerial, and financial regulatory decisions and analysis. Notwithstanding that, it was established that there are a wide range of adversities in using big data in multinational companies. Such of these challenges include data redundancy, privacy concerns and low level of expertise that make the application of big data in financial analysis, projections and decision making less accurate and reliable. In an attempt in overcoming such challenges, the study recommends that; multinational companies should invest in human resource training in order to equip staff with the needed sills to manage big data. Furthermore, analytical systems developers ought to update existing softwares in order to reduce data edundancy and improve data recovery. Lastly, government in consultation with stakeholders should prioritize data privacy and hence ensure adequate advancement of technological infrastructure.Item Regulatory Governance And Taxation Of E-Commerce In Ghana(University Of Ghana, 2021-11) Aprim, E.K.This study aims to understand the regulatory governance of e-commerce entities and how such businesses are taxed, which is limited to the country Ghana. The study considers the regulators of e-commerce and the other institutions that are linked to obtain their perceptions of the regulatory governance and taxation of e-commerce. The qualitative approach is utilized for this study to enhance the depth of the study. Interviews were conducted to ascertain the views of the regulators. In addition, the perceptions of other institutions like practicing firms and other civil society organizations were gathered by way of interviews to broaden the scope of our understanding of e-commerce in Ghana. A within and across case analysis has been performed on data gathered to identify consistencies or otherwise. An extant synthesis of related literature and a review of the websites of the regulators and their regulations supported the content analysis done in this study to understand the concept of regulatory governance and the nature of regulatory governance and taxation of e-commerce in Ghana. Results indicate varied results on the presence of factors supporting regulatory governance in some regulatory institutions, however, this is consistent within and across respondents. Also, results from the taxation of e-commerce indicated the issues in taxing e-commerce and the apparent lack of enforcement of related tax laws, which is primarily because of difficulty in tracing e-commerce entities. In light of the results, some regulatory governance factors should be improved to ensure better regulatory governance. It also brings to the fore the need for revision of tax laws to clearly identify e-commerce entities for tax purposes as there is a growing need to raise more tax revenues in Ghana.Item Corruption Perception And Tax Non-Compliance Among Self-Employed Individuals In Ghana(University Of Ghana, 2022-06) Odartey, E.L.This thesis assesses perceived corruption and tax non-compliance in Ghana within the informal sector; and investigates some key factors that lead to tax non-compliance among individuals within the informal sector of Ghana. Based on a review of the theory of planned behaviour, the study evaluated the impact of perceived corruption, trust in government, tax rate fairness, tax system complexity and religiosity on tax non-compliance. In addition, the study investigates the moderating role of religiosity on the relationships between perceived corruption, trust in government, tax rate fairness, tax system complexity and tax non-compliance. A total of 598 valid responses were received from individuals working within the informal sector. The data was collected via a self-administered questionnaire. A structural model analysis employing the Partial Least Square based on the Structural Equation Modelling technique was used to test the study's hypothesized relationships. The result of the study indicates that individuals with a higher level of perceived corruption are more likely to engage in tax non-compliance. The study further reveals that tax system complexity leads to high levels of tax non-compliance within the informal sector. When individuals are frustrated by the tax system as a whole, they end up evading taxes. The result indicates that tax rate fairness, trust in government and religiosity are negatively related, which suggest individuals in the informal sector would be motivated to comply when they perceive the government and tax system to be transparent. Furthermore, religiosity was able to moderate the relationships between the factors that influence tax non-compliance behaviour. The findings from the study are beneficial to the tax authorities, managers of firms and policy makers in establishing ways to mitigate the occurrence of tax non-compliance behaviour in the informal sector. The study highlights the factors that influence individuals to engage in tax non-compliance behaviour. To academic researchers, the study provides insightful recommendations on carrying out similar future studies with different methodology and populations to contribute to tax and compliance research.Item Implementing And Achieving Sustainable Development Goals Through National Budgeting: Contextualization And Accountability(University Of Ghana, 2021-12) Owusu, B.This study aims to examine the implementation and achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals through national budgeting focusing on the contextualization and accountability issues. Also, the study draws on institutional theory with a focus on myth and ceremonial institutions and accountability framework in analysing the various data. The study adopts the qualitative research approach and uses Ghana as a macro-level single case. Data sources are primary data where semi-structured interviews were conducted and secondary data using reports such as Ghana SDG budget manual, UN SDG reports and Ghana’s development framework. The interview respondents were purposively selected together with the snowballing approach. Finally, the study uses a thematic analysis approach to analyse the data collected. The findings reveal that Ghana has realigned its budgeting items to track the SDGs performance and implementation. In addition, the SDGs have been integrated into the national development framework where Ghana has one development plan, which has led to a modification in Ghana’s budgeting process. Also, the findings suggest Ghana is realigning and integrating the SDGs in order to enhance budget allocation and use the SDGs as a management tool to negotiate for funding and support. Last, Ghana is using a discretionary accountability approach and also, Ghana’s priority in achieving and implementing is to use the national development plan to drive the SDGs. This study is relevant as it provides insight into how Ghana is implementing and achieving the SDGs using its national budgeting and contributes to the limited literature on SDGs and national budgeting as a tool to speed up implementation. The study also highlights the need to involve the private sector’s contribution since the tracking and mapping do not capture their contribution together with actions such as laws and policies to aid implementation since not all the goals are financial in nature.Item Sustainability Reporting Practices Of Listed Firms On The Ghana Stock Exchange And Its Determinants(University of Ghana, 2020-05) Peter, D.The purpose of the study is to analyse the sustainability reporting practices of firms on the Ghana Stock Exchange as well as the factors that influence such practices. Using the Triple-Bottom-Line (TBL) approach, the study conducted a quantitative content analysis of various reports of firms that contains sustainability information to determine the trends and focus of reporting of the sampled firms. The study retrieved 129 firm-years reports from firms listed on the Ghana Stock Exchange (GSE) over 5 years (2015 to 2019). Regression analysis was conducted to examine the determinants of the sustainability reporting practices of these firms and the effect of these practices on financial performance. The study explains the relationships on the premise of the stakeholder-legitimacy-signalling framework. The findings of the study reveal that listed firms in Ghana report more on economic sustainability than environmental and social dimensions as espoused by the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) standard and the level of overall sustainability reporting is low. Even though the extent of reporting by environmentally and socially exposed firms is higher than that of less exposed firms, surprisingly some environmentally-sensitive firms produce no information on their environmental and social impacts. Again, the study finds governance mechanisms, firm size, liquidity, and industry affiliation to be the most predictors of sustainability reporting practices. Lastly, Financial performance was found to have a significant negative relationship with sustainability reporting practices when the market- base metric (Tobin’s Q) is used and insignificant when ROA is used. The study makes recommendations for policy and practice that policies should be designed to make the practice mandatory. Firms are also encouraged to subscribe to the GRI standard to ensure full advantage of sustainability.Item Inclusive Finance, Financial Literacy And Bank Pricing Behaviour In Ghana(University Of Ghana, 2021-09) Abdul-Samed, A.The aim of this study is to examine the effect of financial literacy and bank pricing behaviour on inclusive finance in Ghana. A sample of 1,996 respondents is employed across 10 regions of Ghana for the period 2018. It also relied on a semi-structured questionnaire issued to banks. The study employed a binary probit model to estimate the impact of financial literacy on inclusive finance. A binary probit regression is again employed to examine the influence of bank pricing behaviour on inclusive finance. To examine the interactive effect of financial literacy and bank pricing behaviour on inclusive finance, this study used robust probit models. The study provides the following empirical findings: first, financial literacy has a positively significant impact on inclusive finance; second, the nexus between bank pricing behaviour and inclusive finance shows that loan price has a significant impact on inclusive finance; and, finally, the interactive effect of financial literacy and bank pricing behaviour only shows a significant effect on account ownership and savings. The study makes the following contributions to literature: first, the examination of the impact of bank pricing behaviour on inclusive finance is new in literature; and second, the sensitivity of financial literacy and bank pricing behaviour on inclusive finance is novel in literature. In conclusion, the study demonstrates the essence for inclusive finance policies to be supported by financial education in Ghana. Further, it underscores the need to address the inclusive finance gender gap in Ghana in order to attain a comprehensive financial sector growth. This study also confirms the essence for inclusive finance initiatives to go further than just advocating for basic account ownership to the promotion of account usage in order to take advantage of the potential benefits of inclusive finance.Item Adoption Of Computer-Assisted Audit Tools And Techniques Among Internal Audit Units Of Ghanaian Firms(University of Ghana., 2019-06) Awuah, B.ABSTRACT The study examines the extent of CAATT adoption and utilization among internal audit units of organisations and the factors that influence the adoption decision. Since the advent of automation and rise of “Big Data” in the corporate world, there have been calls for the auditing profession to automate the audit process in an attempt to conduct effective and reliable audits in big data environments. Despite these calls, extant literature indicate that the adoption and usage of technology-based audit tools has been low, particularly within internal audit units. Using the TOE framework as a theoretical lens, quantitative data was sought from a survey of internal audit units of 75 private firms and SOEs through self-administered questionnaires while PLS-SEM and descriptive analyses were employed for the purpose of data analyses. The findings of the study revealed that CAATT adoption rates among organisations in Ghana is fairly high however, the extent of usage low. Risk assessment and fraud detection are areas where CAATT are mostly used within the work of internal audit units. The findings also revealed that CAATT actual adoption and usage in internal audit units are significantly influenced by CAATT behavioural intentions. Moreover, adoption intentions are significantly affected positively by technological readiness (compatibility), organisational readiness (technological competence and management support) and environmental readiness (external pressure and audit standards). The findings offer valuable insights to management, policy makers and regulators on ways to improve the adoption and use of CAATT particularly within internal audit units. Attention should be given to the training of internal auditors as well as resourcing the unit and revising the standards. CAATT developers and vendors should collaborate with internal audit units to enhance the compatibility of CAATT applications to the work on internal auditItem Accounting for the Sustainable Development Goals by Selected Firms in Ghana(University of Ghana, 2021-06) Ackon, D.A.This study attempts to examine the contribution of organisations to the SDGs specifically focusing on how organisations integrate the SDGs into business strategy as well as how the specific targets are prioritised. The study adopts the qualitative research approach thus semi-structured interview is employed to collect data. The purposive sampling method is used to select companies and an employee in each company was interviewed. The result of the study shows that SDGs can influence the business strategy of organisations. As a result, organisations seek to produce products and services that enhance the achievement of the SDGs as well as manage the environmental impact of operations. They also seek to align their CSR programmes to the SDGs to focus on priority issues that contribute to sustainability. Organisations' contributions to the SDGs require partnership with other stakeholders to build competency. In addition, they are selective with partners they engage with to build a favourable brand or image. The study also finds that companies select SDG priorities considering the nature of activities and their impact socially and environmentally. Organisations report on the SDGs to obtain social recognition, competitive advantage, image, and brand enhancement, comply with regulatory requirements and attract investors. The scope of the study is limited to analyse the potential contributions of companies to the SDGs. Hence the study does not focus on the efforts of other institutions like the public sector and civil societies. The study fills existing gap in literature by providing an understanding of how organisations integrate SDGs into the business. The study further provides insights on the prioritization process as the phenomenon has received less attention in the literature.