Waste decomposition analysis in Japanese manufacturing sectors for material flow cost accounting

Abstract

From the perspective of material flow cost accounting (MFCA), which treats both material and financial flows within a company, this study proposes a corporate waste decomposition model to investigate the effects of material and financial factors on corporate waste generation. The proposed model decomposes waste into the material loss (waste ratio of raw materials [WRMat]), raw material-to-cost ratio (RtCR; material use efficiency), cost-to-sales ratio (or COGSR), total asset turnover ratio (TATR), leverage, and total equity. As an application, the waste decomposition analysis is performed using the log-mean Divisia index (LMDI) method, and 125 listed firms in 5 Japanese manufacturing sectors from 2010 to 2015 are analyzed. The LMDI results show that the RtCR, the most crucial term in MFCA, had the largest effect on increases in waste generation as of 2015; however, this effect is not so robust among sectors over the years, implying that MFCA is valid mainly for specific companies/sectors or years. Also, corporate environmental burdens (waste and carbon emission) are likely to be correlated negatively with leverage and positively with total equity in the models, implying that the financial and stock markets have an essential role in deciding corporate environmental burdens.