پذیرش استانداردهای بین المللی گزارش دهی مالی در یک کشور در حال توسعه غیرمستعمره: کشور نپال

The purpose of this paper is to provide a systematic and rigorous analysis of the accounting environment in Nepal. Based on the accounting ecology framework developed by Gernon and Wallace (1995) and interviewing selected key stakeholders, it critically examines issues related to the adoption of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) in Nepal. It contributes to the literature by examining issues associated with the adoption of IFRS in a non-colonized developing country. This study finds that the decision to adopt IFRS in Nepal is not driven by the needs of local organizations and is rather imposed by donor organizations such as the Asian Development Bank, International Monetary Fund and World Bank. The findings of this study provide evidence that the adoption of IFRS is likely to be problematic due to the country's contextual environment. Specifically, there is a severe lack of qualified accountants in Nepal and the accounting profession is not ready to adopt IFRS. The study also finds that social problems such as widespread corruption and fraud are likely to cause problems for the adoption of IFRS.

Globalization of production, development of global consumer and capital markets, and growth of multinational companies brought together the need to establish a single set of financial reporting standards (Flower, 1997). With the aim to reduce international differences in accounting standards, among others, the International Accounting Standard Board (IASB)1 is developing such a set of financial reporting standards for use internationally. The development of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) is supported, for example, by the assumption that a single set of global accounting standards is an important means of enhancing comparability of financial statements and reducing the cost of preparing financial statements. During the last few years there has been a significant increase in the number of countries that have adopted IFRS with more than 120 countries requiring or permitting IFRS for financial reporting purposes. IFRS have been adopted both in industrialized countries such as the United Kingdom, Germany and Italy, and developing countries such as Bangladesh, Kazakhstan and Bolivia. Achieving comparability in financial reporting depends upon whether IFRS are adopted in a similar and consistent manner across countries. However, differences in, for example, legal systems, taxation, sources of finance, inflation, political ties, colonial history, and culture cause diversity in accounting practices (for example, Doupnik and Salter, 1995, Evans, 2004, Jaggi and Low, 2000, Nobes, 1998, Richardson, 2007 and Salter and Doupnik, 1992). These contextual factors are deeply embedded in the accounting environment of a country. As such, they may not be simply changed and could act as impediments to similar adoption of IFRS across countries. Additionally, achieving comparability in financial reporting depends on a consistent interpretation and application of IFRS across countries. Social, political, economic and cultural factors in countries influence accountants' professional judgments, and differences across countries may lead to an inconsistent interpretation and application of IFRS. Several studies provided evidence that professional judgments are applied inconsistently across countries, especially if countries have accounting environments that are different from those in Anglo-American countries where IFRS were developed (Doupnik and Richter, 2003 and Doupnik and Richter, 2004). Over the last few years research related to the adoption of IFRS has focused largely on the member countries of the European Union and other industrialized countries (for example Callao et al., 2007, Doupnik and Richter, 2004, Hail et al., 2010, Hellmann et al., 2010 and Jermakowtcz, 2004). Importantly, even at a time when more and more developing countries are adopting IFRS, there are only few studies that examine the adoption of IFRS in those countries. For example, the studies in this category include those focusing on Indonesia (Perera & Baydoun, 2007), Zimbabwe (Chamisa, 2000), Mexico and South Africa (Prather-Kinsey, 2006), Trinidad and Tobago (Bowrin, 2007), Pakistan (Ashraf & Ghani, 2005) and Kazakhstan (Tyrrall, Woodward, & Rakhimbekova, 2007). However, all of these countries were colonized by industrialized countries in the past. For example, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Pakistan, and Trinidad and Tobago were colonized by England; Mexico, Indonesia, and Kazakhstan were colonized by Spain, the Netherlands and Russia, respectively. This is important because these colonial powers often transferred both accounting ideas and accountants to their colonies, and highly influenced the development of accounting in those countries. For example, Ashraf and Ghani (2005) highlight that Pakistan exhibits some of the properties of its former colonial power England, namely two separate sets of reporting requirements and no direct involvement of government in standard setting. They also highlight that England's trained accountants have been a major source of influence on accounting practices in Pakistan. As such, the accounting environment of countries with a colonial past may feature characteristics such as a well-established professional body which may support IFRS adoption in those countries, whereas countries without colonial past may lack such characteristics. Using the accounting ecology framework developed by Gernon and Wallace (1995), this paper provides a systematic and rigorous analysis of the main features of the accounting environment in Nepal. In addition, the paper examines potential issues associated with the adoption of IFRS in Nepal by interviewing selected key stakeholders such as academics, professional accountants and auditors, personnel from the Accounting Board of Nepal (ASB) and the Ministry of Finance, and by surveying available documents and literature. Nepal, represented by the Institute of Chartered Accountants in Nepal (ICAN) and the ASB, has decided to adopt IFRS from July, 2012. It offers an interesting setting to examine potential issues associated with the adoption of IFRS because it is a non-colonized developing country with a strong indigenous cultural heritage. Importantly, no prior studies have examined issues related to the adoption of IFRS in a non-colonized developing country even though there is a rich literature in international accounting suggesting that colonial history is an important factor affecting the accounting environment of a country (Hove, 1986, Doupnik and Salter, 1995, Gernon and Meek, 2001, Yapa, 2006, Perera and Baydoun, 2007 and Muniandy and Ali, 2012).