Sustainable Production of Pulses under Saline Lands in India

The decreasing agricultural lands along with waste lands and poor water resources are the main constraints for sustainable agricultural production. The need of time is to produce maximum with minimum inputs. Depleting levels of major and micro-nutrients in Indian soils have been on the rise, and situation may be more harmful if corrective measures are not followed in time. The soil nutrient deficiencies significantly reduce the crop yields in addition to the soil fertility. In preview of this, the need of the hour is to conserve agricultural sustainability, soil health enhancement, and water management. Farmers are forced to use saline water for irrigation in areas with poor quality water or less available water for irrigation, specifically in arid or semi-arid regions. Every crop plants have threshold limit of tolerance beyond which salinity decreases the crop yield. Legumes are very sensitive crops towards soil salinity, and secondary salinization mainly through irrigation water is the hardest challenge for survival of legume crops in arid regions. In view of this, the sustainability of legumes in salt affected areas is a big challenge for crop productivity being sessile to salinity. Hence, the possible strategies for sustainability of salt sensitive legumes have been briefly reviewed in this chapter.