In recent years, reporting requirements placed on companies have broadened significantly. Responding to investor demand for a more holistic picture about a companies’ performance and prospects, annual reports and accounts now cover a far wider range of topics than historically – particularly in the areas of non-financial reporting and sustainability reporting.

Launched in 2009, the original focus of ICAEW’s Financial Reporting Faculty was to provide members with support and guidance specifically on financial reporting matters.

More recently, new reporting requirements have tended to relate to content in the front half of the annual report, an area often referred to as non-financial or narrative reporting. Regulations requiring most companies to produce a strategic report and for quoted companies to report on greenhouse gas emissions in their directors’ reports were introduced in 2013. Developments since have included requirements to produce a section 172(1) statement (a statement explaining how the directors have complied with their s172 duty to promote the success of the company) and carbon and energy reporting regulations.