Chapters authored
Sustainable Production of Pulses under Saline Lands in India
The decreasing agricultural lands along with waste lands and poor water resources are the main constraints for sustainable agricultural production. The need of time is to produce maximum with minimum inputs. Depleting levels of major and micro-nutrients in Indian soils have been on the rise, and situation may be more harmful if corrective measures are not followed in time. The soil nutrient deficiencies significantly reduce the crop yields in addition to the soil fertility. In preview of this, the need of the hour is to conserve agricultural sustainability, soil health enhancement, and water management. Farmers are forced to use saline water for irrigation in areas with poor quality water or less available water for irrigation, specifically in arid or semi-arid regions. Every crop plants have threshold limit of tolerance beyond which salinity decreases the crop yield. Legumes are very sensitive crops towards soil salinity, and secondary salinization mainly through irrigation water is the hardest challenge for survival of legume crops in arid regions. In view of this, the sustainability of legumes in salt affected areas is a big challenge for crop productivity being sessile to salinity. Hence, the possible strategies for sustainability of salt sensitive legumes have been briefly reviewed in this chapter.
Part of the book: Legume Crops
Ecological and Economic Potential of Major Halophytes and Salt Tolerant Vegetation in India
Soil salinization is a global and climatic phenomenon that affects various spheres of life. The present rate of salinization is perilously fast because of global climate change and associated events leading to enhanced land degradation, loss of soil fertility and crop productivity. In this chapter, we tried to focus on the arid and semiarid regions of India along with our coastal zone which are economically fragile regions and need much closer attention. In future, India will face extreme pressure on its land resources in agriculture because of likely rapid degradation of these resources. Thus, salt affected soils must be brought under cultivation by adopting site specific strategies to ensure national food and nutritional security. In this regard, a comprehensive review of the major halophytes of these ecological zones, its mechanism of salt tolerance, ecological and economic potential is done. The potential applications of saline land vegetation including halophytes in climate change mitigation, phytoremediation, desalination, food, secondary metabolite and nutraceutical production, medicine, and saline agriculture have been discussed. Further, we tried to focus on popular farmer adopted halophytic species including edible ones, their uses, products of economic significance etc. which is highly imperative for effective utilization of these saline soils leading to improved livelihood and sustenance of resource poor farmers along with improved ecological balance.
Part of the book: Abiotic Stress in Plants