Ecosystem Services Market Consortium

What it reported doing in 2025

Ecosystem services market consortium (esmc) is a non-profit, member-based organization that recognizes and rewards farmers and ranchers for their environmental services to society. Esmc members represent the spectrum of the agricultural sector supply chain with whom we are scaling sustainable agricultural sector outcomes, including increased soil carbon, reduced net greenhouse gases, and improved water quality and water use conservation. We launched eco-harvest, a voluntary, national ecosystem services market program in may 2022. (continued on sch o) during 2025, we continued to engage agricultural value chain and supply chain partners in market program innovation, testing, and refinement to further build our program. Refinements to protocols, data collection, project development and partnership engagement models proceeded, as did efforts to test and embed advanced tools and technologies into our platform. The results include continued programmatic streamlining and achievement of critical cost-efficiencies to enable scaled program operations. With the generous support of a grant from the foundation for food & agriculture research (ffar) and from many additional funders, members, and collaborators, we have achieved critical progress since launching our public private partnership in 2019 and ecoharvest in 2022. As of the end of 2025, we had 11 projects across the us and canada with 232,581 acres enrolled. We continued to work toward scaling these programs, with a goal of enrolling 445,000 acres by the end of 2026. The majority of these acres are row crops, with a focus on corn, soy, wheat, and cotton. In addition, we continue to pilot projects in grazing (beef) and dairy systems. We launched a protocol for water quality outcomes and released v2 of our water quality tool that connects field level outcomes to watersheds, allowing corporates to understand how their sourcing impacts the larger ecosystem. Our pilot converting edge-of-field areas to native species in Kansas continues and the esmc biodiversity tool and protocol will launch in q2 2026. We have partnered with a new modeling service provider, habiterre, and have transitioned our program to focus on inventory accounting, allowing corporates to meet climate commitments, such as sbti.we continue to work to address the needs of economically disadvantaged producers. In 2025, we developed the ecoharvest project mapping tool to map carbon sequestration potential and impaired waterways across the lower 48. This work helps prioritize project development in those areas with the best potential for positive carbon and water outcomes. This mapping tool was made available to esmc members as a key member benefit.on the buyer front, we successfully implemented a co-claiming/co-investment model with two corporate partners. A buyer of impact units can claim a share of emissions reductions or removals with other stakeholders in the value chain; co-claiming is a unique feature of scope 3. Co-claiming transactions are tracked on sustaincert's vivid platform to prevent double-counting and track appropriate volume of transactions. Utilizing this program as a template, we are replicating this co-claiming model with other existing and emerging projects. This is a powerful program offering to boost program economic feasibility and scale.we worked to improve our payment model by gathering feedback from farmers and on-the-ground partners. Given this feedback, we implemented a hybrid payment model that provides participating farmers upfront payments for practice implementation and outcome payments once outcomes have been achieved. We tested this model in projects throughout 2025.

Financial Efficiency

• Mission deployment rate: 64.5%; rating input score 65
• Program expense ratio: 80.2%; rating input score 80
• Fundraising efficiency: Limited

Transparency & Controls

• Consistency checks: 100%; rating input score 100; 63rd percentile among comparable filings
• Pay-setting controls: 2 of 6 controls in place; rating input score 33
  • Compensation committee: Missing
  • Independent consultant: Missing
  • Other Form 990s reviewed: Missing
  • Written employment contract: Missing
  • Compensation survey or study: Pass
  • Board or committee approval: Pass
• Foreign activity oversight: Scored; rating input score 0
• Grant itemization coverage: Scored; rating input score 0
• Major donor itemization: Yes; rating input score 100
• Related-party transparency: Limited

Accountability

• Independent voting board: 100%; rating input score 100; 63rd percentile among comparable filings
• Governance controls: 8 of 9 controls in place; rating input score 89
  • Conflict-of-interest policy: Pass
  • Whistleblower policy: Pass
  • Document-retention policy: Pass
  • CEO compensation review process: Pass
  • Other executive compensation review process: Pass
  • Form 990 shared with the board: Fail
  • Board meeting minutes documented: Pass
  • Audit committee oversight: Pass
  • Independent financial-statement audit: Pass

Sustainability

• Operating margin: 20.5%; rating input score 73; 73rd percentile among comparable filings
• Total-asset coverage ratio: 1.28; rating input score 42; 42nd percentile among comparable filings
• Liabilities to assets ratio: 0.52; rating input score 15; 15th percentile among comparable filings
• Officer compensation ratio: 41.6%; rating input score 3; 3rd percentile among comparable filings

Growth

• Program expense growth: -25.1% per year; rating input score 0; 1st percentile among comparable filings
• Revenue growth: -12.9% per year; rating input score 0; 1st percentile among comparable filings
• Asset growth: 2.2% per year; rating input score 100; 18th percentile among comparable filings