Legumes for sustainable soil and crop management

Abstract

The climatic variations and swiftly increasing the world's population are crucial drivers of universal famines and lead to the stern food insecurity. These factors affect all the magnitudes of food collateral, such as food accessibility, consumption, reliability, and constancy, and also strengthen additional calamities allied with health concerns of plants, animals, and environment. Although applications of agrochemicals to the soil largely contributed to increased food production, extensive use of these leads to the nutrient disparity and environmental hazards resulting in considerable economic losses. Consequently, it is utmost important to manage the application of agrochemicals with the aim of increased food production in environmental as well as economical unthreatened manner. Legumes have a great potential to enhance crop diversity as well as productivity and to reduce dependence on exterior inputs as legumes are well known for their illustrious capabilities such as nitrogen (N) fixation by biological means, increase in soil organic matter (SOM), efficient roles in nutrient and water retention, and improvement in soil properties which contribute to recover soil health. These manifold abilities of legumes make them potential candidates for management of agriculture in a sustainable way. The upshots of sustainable agriculture can be optimistic for higher food production and to ensure future food availability in an eco-friendly manner by reducing the usage of agrochemicals and maintaining the nutrient balances in the soil.