An Executive Guide to IFRS: Content, Costs and Benefits to Business

CHAPTER 9

THE IASB’S STANDARD-SETTING PROCESS

This chapter provides a detailed analysis of the standard-setting process. It aims to show all of the stages in the writing of a standard and explain how the constituent can interact with the standard-setter and help shape the standard in some way. The chapter also discusses the organizational structure and the functions of the various committees that operate together under the aegis of the IFRS Foundation.

This chapter looks at how the IASB sets standards, at what points the standard-setters consult their constituents, and how you can influence their standard-setting. You may wonder if you need to know this – in fact not, if all you are interested in doing is applying IFRS or reading financial statements that are based on IFRS. However, a little knowledge of the process will help you understand the context when you may read a report about an ‘exposure draft’ being issued or something like that. Finally, you may want to engage much more closely with the system, keep well informed on what the IASB is doing and be aware what changes are coming down the line. In that case you should read this chapter attentively!

One of the marked differences in national standard-setting systems is the extent to which accounting standards are actually part of statute law, and the legal authority of the standard-setter. In anglophone countries there is a tradition of standard-setting being done by technical experts within a general framework provided by ...