Recent Advancement on Climate Resilient Millets for Food and Nutrition Security: Time to Promote for All Seasons

Abstract

Millets are climate-resilient crops adapting to wide range of ecological conditions requiring less irrigation with better growth and productivity in low nutrient input conditions depending minimal on artificial fertilizers and vulnerability to environmental stresses. The nutritionally superior millets are still confined to the traditional consumers and populations of lower economic strata. There is need to revive the importance of millet groups as health foods to enhance food and nutritional security. Millets due to their nutritive value have potential health benefits to prevent cancers, decrease the occurrence of cardiovascular diseases, reduce tumor proliferation, lower blood pressure, risk of heart diseases, cholesterol content, rate of fat absorption, delayed gastric emptying and increased gastrointestinal bulk. Value-addition to millet grains as ready-to-eat and ready-to-cook items offers good opportunity to farmers for enhanced income generation, promotes production and marketing leading to nutritional security, employment and revenue generation. These are nutritious with health benefits requiring significantly lesser inputs and cost of cultivation along with naturally being tolerant to most biotic and abiotic stresses. These features of millets accentuate them as crops of choice in the present scenario.