Environmental management accounting and innovation: an exploratory analysis Aldo ´nio Ferreira and Carly Moulang Department of Accounting and Finance, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia, and Bayu Hendro JANA (NAB Group), Melbourne, Australia Abstract Purpose – Increased awareness regarding environmental issues has encouraged organisations to use environmental management accounting (EMA), which has been said to deliver many benefits to users, including an increase in innovation. There is, however, little evidence to consubstantiate this claim and thus this paper aims to investigate the issue. It also seeks to examine the role of strategy with EMA use and innovation. Design/methodology/approach – The paper uses a survey designed and administered to management accountants and financial controllers in large Australian businesses. Findings – The analysis suggests that EMA use has a positive association with process innovation, but not with product innovation. It also finds that the effect of strategy on innovation was driven by the level of commitment to research and development. However, no statistically significant relationship between strategy and EMA use was found. The key driver of EMA use was industry. Research limitations/implications – The small sample size is the most important limitation of this study and affected the statistical power of the analysis conducted. The results need to be interpreted with caution. Practical implications – The study suggests that EMA use is associated with process innovation, implying that economic benefits may be realised by using this technique, while simultaneously enhancing environmental performance. Originality/value – This is the first study to provide cross-sectional evidence of the relationship between strategy, EMA use and innovation. It is also the first to propose a research instrument to measure EMA use as a multi-item construct. Keywords Environmental management, Innovation, Australia, Management accounting, Corportate strategy Paper type Research paper 1. Introduction As a growing area of research, environmental management accounting (EMA) has received relatively little attention from accounting researchers. There has been some The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at www.emeraldinsight.com/0951-3574.htm For their comments and suggestions, the authors are grateful to Roger Burritt, Jean-Francois Henri, Paul Collier, David Smith, Stephen Smith, Zahirul Hoque, Lokman Mia, Richard Macve, Reg Matthews, and the participants of A-CSEAR 2008 Conference, EAA 2008 Annual Congress, and GAOC 2008 Conference. The authors are also grateful to two anonymous reviewers for their comments and recommendations. Thanks also go to Wynne Chin for the use of PLS-Graph 3.0. AAAJ 23,7 920 Received 22 December 2008 Revised 30 September 2009 Accepted 26 November 2009 Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal Vol. 23 No. 7, 2010 pp. 920-948 q Emerald Group Publishing Limited 0951-3574 DOI 10.1108/09513571011080180