Biotechnological interventions in horticulture & sustainable livelihood

Abstract

The ever increasing demand for food, feed, nutrition and other basic needs like jobs and health, as compounded by the burgeoning population has put a lot of pressure on the agricultural and horticultural sectors in terms of addressing the accompanied challenges associated with increasing crop productivity while maintaining environmental sustainability. At the same time, we are witnessing the potential benefits of the revolutions propelled by the science of biotechnology. The realistic utilization of biotechnology in horticulture has not only brought about profound changes in the crop productivity and quality, but has also opened up newer and hitherto unforeseen potential vistas including engineering novel traits, successful commercial micropropagation, manipulating plant architecture and molecular farming. Challenges like biotic and abiotic stresses, gradually reducing crop productivity and environmental safety, demand for newer products in terms of phytoneutraceuticals, exotic plant types, healthy planting materials, post harvest losses, export quality plant products and designer horticultural crops have been constantly addressed successfully using modern horticultural biotechnology. A major challenge of sustainable livelihood in the developing nations can be met with the judicious and rational application of horticultural biotechnology along with other equally powerful crop production systems. How this challenge can be realistically addressed by exploiting the opportunities provided by biotechnology-will be discussed in this paper.