Tiny Microbes, Big Yields: enhancing food crop production with biological solutions

Abstract

Plant-associated microbiomes have tremendous potential to improve plant resilience and yields in farming systems. There is increasing evidence that biological technologies that use microbes or their metabolites can enhance nutrient uptake and yield, control pests and mitigate plant stress responses. However, to fully realize the potential of microbial technology, their efficacy and consistency under the broad range of real-world conditions need to be improved. While the optimization of microbial biofertilizers and biopesticides is advancing rapidly to enable use in various soils, crop varieties and environments, crop breeding programmes have yet to incorporate the selection of beneficial plant-microbe interactions to breed 'microbe-optimized plants'. Emerging efforts exploring microbiome engineering could lead to microbial consortia that are better suited to support plants. The combination of all three approaches could be integrated to achieve maximum benefits and significantly improved crop yields to address food security.

Figure 1

Sustainable increase in farm productivity by harnessing microbial technologies is critical for delivery of multiple Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). It will primary contribute to SDGs 2 (by increasing farm productivity) and 1 (by increasing farm profitability) but will also significantly contribute to SDGs 3, 6, 13 and 15 by improving nutrient quality, reducing environmental chemical pollutions, reducing greenhouse gas emission and promoting soil biodiversity respectively. SDGs 8 and 9 will benefit from creating of new industry for the production of microbial products and formulation. The cartoons of individual SDGs were obtained from UN SDGs web page (http://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/sustainable-development-goals/).