Record Details

Small millets for enduring food security amidst pandemics

NIPGR Digital Knowledge Repository (NDKR)

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Field Value
 
Title Small millets for enduring food security amidst pandemics
 
Creator Muthamilarasan, Mehanathan
Prasad, Manoj
 
Subject covid19
small millets
food security
nutritional security
food diversity
 
Description Accepted date: 6 September 2020
Highlights
Over-reliance on a small number of major cereals impacts on the food and nutritional security of the global population, particularly during abnormal situations.

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic challenges the lives and livelihood of marginal communities by limiting their access to these crops.

Diversification of food crops is necessary to address food and nutritional security, and promoting the cultivation of alternative crops in marginal areas is imperative. Food security is an ongoing problem, and current staple foods are not sufficient
to overcome challenges such as the present COVID-19 pandemic. We propose
here that small millets have the potential to become new staple crops, especially
in hunger hotspots. Currently, the absence of intensification of millet farming,
lack of deployment of genetic tools for trait improvement, and the need for optimization of storage and supply chains limit crop production. We highlight a
roadmap to strengthen small millet cultivation, such as identifying varieties suitable for particular environments and targeting trait improvement using genetic
and genomic approaches. These approaches will help to combat hunger and
malnutrition and also economically benefit the farmers and stakeholders
involved in small millet cultivation amidst the ongoing pandemic.
The work of the authors on millet genetics and genomics is supported by the core grant of the National Institute of Plant
Genome Research (NIPGR), New Delhi, India. M.M. acknowledges the Early Career Research Award from Science and
Engineering Research Board, Department of Science and Technology, Government of India (file ECR/2017/001526). The
authors also thank Dr Swarup K. Parida, NIPGR, for critically reading the manuscript.
 
Date 2020-09-07T06:34:45Z
2020-09-07T06:34:45Z
2021
 
Type Article
 
Identifier Trends in Plant Science, 26(1): 33-40
1360-1385
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tplants.2020.08.008
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1360138520302557
http://223.31.159.10:8080/jspui/handle/123456789/1090
 
Language en_US
 
Format application/pdf
 
Publisher Elsevier B.V.