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The Saudi Organization for Certified Public Accountants (SOCPA) requires that International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS), as endorsed in Saudi Arabia, be used by all listed and unlisted companies. This study aims to provide insight into IFRS implementation problems, based on a survey sent to Saudi Arabian companies listed on Tadawul, the Saudi stock market (i.e. financial hub in the Middle East).

The survey focused on the impact that IFRS conversion has had on companies, their accounting and their finance strategies. The benefits and challenges of the adoption of IFRS are analyzed, including matters pertaining to the level of understanding and experience with IFRS, perceptions about the quality of IFRS and the impact of adoption of IFRS on consolidated equity and net income.

The survey had a response rate of 72 per cent. The results indicate a majority of respondents support conversion to IFRS as it results in higher quality financial reporting; the most important expected benefits of adopting IFRS include greater reporting transparency and improved comparability with other businesses; other expected benefits include harmonization of internal and external reporting, and increased cross-border investment opportunities; the IFRS process is costly and ties up resources because of its complexity and training needed and companies expect increased volatility in reported financial results that will impact share option plans and/or other incentive plans tied to profits. However, the authors find strong support among preparers of the financial statements for IFRS, as evidenced by higher agreement among respondents to the survey on the benefits of adopting IFRS, rather than on the costs of its adoption. Furthermore, the analysis shows that the likelihood of Saudi Arabian firms that are in favor of adopting IFRS decreases if the audit firm is one of the Big 4. The reason for this negative relationship could be that the cost of transition toward IFRS will be high. Therefore, Saudi Arabian firms will not favor a transition toward IFRS when their audit firm belongs to the Big 4. Most difficult to implement IFRS, as listed by respondents, include those on financial instruments, revenue, leases and employee benefits.

The authors show how economic and environmental factors play a critical role in the IFRS implementation process. This study should be important to all countries worldwide that are in the process of adopting IFRS.

The aim of this study is to tell a story about how the coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic affects small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), using Saudi Arabia as an example. In particular, this study explores how SMEs in Saudi Arabia address needed changes in their survival strategy in the market during the COVID-19 pandemic.

This reflective essay is based on the “White Paper 3” of the Global SME Policy Network (GSPN). The GSPN is a global think tank based in Saudi Arabia. As one of the founding leaders of the GSPN and one of the authors of White Paper 03, the author writes this reflective essay based on the interviews of the Chief Executive Officers of 111 SMEs in Saudi Arabia. The interviewees were from six administrative areas including Al-Baaha, Eastern Region, Madinah, Makkah, Qassim and Riyadh. Importantly, 84.7%interviewees were from Riyadh.

The government has provided significant efforts and stimulus package to keep stable employment and small and medium businesses. A majority of the companies were satisfied with the stimulus packages announced by the government. The author believes that organizations need to monitor and evaluate all the developments associated with the spread of the emerging virus and to develop and implement contingency plans to meet any undesirable circumstances arising from COVID-19 pandemic.

The author believes that the role of SMEs in economic transformation and Vision 2030 is imperative. The author observes that Saudi Arabia is working to increase the contribution of SMEs to gross domestic product from 20% to 35%. Other countries should continuously evaluate the SME impact because of the COVID-19 and continue the support based on the evaluation report such as Saudi Arabia.

This study aims to examine the causal relationship between tourism and overall well-being. The main objective of this research is to inform the policymakers that tourism can play a vital role in shaping the overall well-being in the developing economies.

This investigation used several time series techniques and procedures that include bounds test and autoregressive distributed lag mechanism to analyze the relationship between tourism and overall well-being in Pakistan by using time series data for the period 1980-2016.

The findings suggest a significant positive relationship between tourism and overall well-being both in the short and long run. The authors find that tourism and overall well-being affect each other positively.

This research indicates that policymakers and government can improve the overall well-being through tourism development. However, tourism policies and long-term planning should be focused on sustainable developments for achieving long-term goals. Besides, special incentives should be provided to the private sector for tourism development.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first investigation that examines the causal relationships between tourism and overall well-being through objective indicators in a developing economy. This study fills the immense literature gap and provides new directions to scholars to investigate the mentioned relationship through objective indicators.

This study aims to investigate how culture can either reinforce or attenuate the board efficacy (a key element of corporate governance).

The study uses the data from the World Economic Forum (2006-2014) of 69 countries. The data were restricted to 69 countries because Hofstede et al. (2010) provided cultural value data from 111 countries. However, the data from 42 countries were incomplete for Hofstede et al.’s four dimensions.

The study is the first to show that more religious diversity has a significant negative impact on stronger board efficacy in evaluating corporate governance practices. The results also indicate that more uncertainty avoidance in a country has a significant negative impact and corporate ethics and auditing standards have a positive impact on board efficacy.

The study extends Hofstede et al.’s (2010) cultural value by incorporating religious diversity and corporate ethics as cultural variables in explaining board efficacy in corporate governance literature. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund should focus on cultural factors while developing a single set of Corporate Governance Code worldwide.

The International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) have been adopted by 140 countries around the globe, including the G20 countries. Most of the prior literature focuses on adoption issues in developed countries. Due to the paucity of research on implementation issues in developing countries, the purpose of this paper is to explore the impediments of IFRS implementation in a developing country from 1998 to 2014 based on the auditors’ perceptions and documentary analyses.

Three rounds of interviews (2010, 2012, and 2014) from a total of 75 auditors (including 12 internal auditors and 13 external auditors) were conducted and enforcement documents from 1998 to 2010 were evaluated. The purpose of the three rounds of interviews was to explore the reflection on the changes which the interviewees have experienced over a five-year period.

Using institutional isomorphism, the results suggest that policy makers should focus on several factors to implement IFRS effectively, including low audit fees, a lack of qualified accountants, a lack of interest in IFRS by managers of some companies, a culture of secrecy, and a family-based private sector. Surprisingly, chartered accountancy firms are able to continue their work because of a culture of non-punishment for violating rules and the absence of any reliable exercising of due care or professional ethics in Bangladesh. Regulators such as the Bangladesh Securities and Exchange Commission (BSEC) and the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Bangladesh are not inclined to enforce actions against corrupt chartered accountant firms. This raises question about the professional integrity of auditors as well as regulators. Unlike, Albu et al. (2011) (World Bank as coercive) and Hassan et al. (2014) (western influence as coercive), the findings of this study imply that coercive isomorphism (regulatory authorities in Bangladesh) should be more proactive to ensure a successful implementation of IFRS.

This study has some limitations, including transcribing information from Bengali to English and some enforcement documents were not available on the BSEC website. This last limitation is mitigated by the fact that a substantial number of enforcement releases (1,647 enforcement notices for a 13-year period) are analysed and three rounds of interviews were conducted.

The findings of this study contribute to, and advance the incremental knowledge of IFRS implementation issues and auditing literature in a developing country’s experience to policy makers (e.g. World Bank, IMF, Basel Committee, G20, IOSCO, and IFAC). The findings may be generalised to other developing countries that are facing effective implementation of IFRS.

Due to scarcity of research in governance and accountability in private higher education in developing countries, the purpose of this paper is to explore the tensions surrounding good governance in legitimizing accountability in private universities in developing countries with reference to Bangladesh.

Mixed methods are employed: a quantitative survey of 1,576 students from all 79 private universities; qualitative interviews with 23 stakeholders; and policy documents including the Private University Acts, the World Bank Report and newspapers (1992-2015) were evaluated. The objectives of these mixed methods in this study are juxtaposed and generate complementary insights that together create a bigger picture surrounding governance and accountability issues.

Using Clark's (1983) triangle model (i.e. state control, academic oligarchy, and market forces together with the external influence of donors and boards of trustees as internal governance) and new institutional theory (DiMaggio and Powell, 1983), the major contributions of this study are explaining the root causes of the poor governance of private universities through three related factors: the substantial political power and autonomy held by boards of trustees; a lack of enforcement of Private University Act; and a lack of coordination among stakeholders. The coercive power of the state becomes powerless since the board of trustees ultimately enjoys political power and “does whatever it can.” The lack of coordination of the academic oligarchy (e.g. professors and academics) and market forces (represented by students) by the board of trustees creates a paradox of governance and hence a decoupling of formal policies and actual practice.

The findings have major policy implications for local and international policymakers for improving good governance in private universities in developing countries.

The novelty of the study's findings represents an initial effort to understand the complex and persistent phenomenon of prolonged poor governance of private universities in developing countries, which is largely neglected in the literature. This will undoubtedly contribute to literature and policy implications.