Convergence to International Financial Reporting Standards: Country Perspectives

Globalization of business investment and capital markets has kicked-off much before the 21st century. This has led to a demand for high-quality information by corporates in their financial statements. In grappling with this demand, many countries have imbibed International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) that have been approved by International Accounting Standard Board (IASB) for their corporate statements. At present, IFRS are required or accepted by over 100 countries and this number will grow in times to come. Around 10,000 companies in and around Europe are already using IFRS and this trend is spreading to Asian and African countries too. If sources are to be believed, Chinese companies are all set to adopt IFRS, Brazil is starting adopting IFRS in 2010, Canada is starting by 2011 and even India has decided that its Accounting Standards will be fully convergent with IFRS from April 1, 2011. The book brings out relevant topics on the significance of shifting towards IFRS by various countries across the globe. This volume revolves around the perspectives of various countries that will either be using IFRS or would have their national GAAPs converged to IFRS. Overall, the book tries to cover all variables that form accounting systems in any country, such as source of finance, economic development, education, culture, tax, inflation, law, etc.