Sustainability Disclosure and External Assurance of Reports in the Italian Agrifood Sector

The European Union introduced the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) with the aim of aligning the ‘walk’ - the implementation of substantive sustainability practices, and the ‘talk’, their representation in sustainability reporting. This study assesses whether expectations surrounding the CSRD’s approval were associated with changes in the number of agrifood companies disclosing sustainability reports (SRs). Because increased institutional pressure does not necessarily coincide with higher reporting quality, and given that the CSRD introduces provisions on external assurance, we also examine what are the financial characteristics of firms that voluntarily obtained external assurance prior to the directive’s full implementation. Focusing on the Italian agrifood industry – where the ‘walk’-‘talk’ gap is viewed as particularly salient due to greenhushing propensity and supply-chain fragmentation - we analyse a panel of 1,235 firms from 2013 to 2021. The analysis reveals a statistically significant increase in SR publication in 2021 and indicates that obtaining external assurance is positively associated with revenue and negatively associated with leverage. These patterns point to an acceleration in sustainability disclosure and offer evidence relevant to managerial practice and policy design under the expected CSRD approval in 2021.