Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of corporate governance (hereafter, CG) reforms on the risk disclosure quality in an emerging economy, namely Pakistan. The authors also investigate the impact of CG reforms on the relationship between CG practices and risk disclosure quality.

Design/methodology/approach
The authors use a manual content analysis method to a sample of non-financial companies listed on the PSX-100 index for 2009–2015, to examine the impact of CG reforms on risk disclosure quality. The authors use pooled ordinary least squares and the system GMM estimations to test the research hypotheses.

Findings
The authors find that CG reforms have a positive impact on risk disclosure quality. The results indicate that certain CG practices such as CEO duality and board independence are associated with risk disclosure quality. Interestingly, the findings also highlight the effectiveness of CG reforms by showing that the revised code positively moderates the CG practices and risk disclosure relationship.

Practical implications
The findings of the study have policy implications for regulatory bodies of emerging economies trying to strengthen the CG structures and to introduce risk disclosure regulations to cater the information need of stakeholders.

Originality/value
The authors provide new empirical evidence for the impact of CG reforms on risk disclosure quality using a unique setting of an emerging economy, namely Pakistan.