Biotic and Abiotic Interactions of Diverse Organisms Acting as Biofertilizer and their Role in Soil Enrichment

Abstract

In response to world’s rapidly increasing population from 6.1 billion in 2000 to 8 billion in 2022, global demands for food and food security is multiplying by folds every year. Also due to factors like deforestation, urbanization, soil pollution etc., the land available for the agricultural purposes is shrinking. To cope up with the increasing demand of agricultural end products i.e. grains, fruits, vegetables, pulses etc. farmers need to increases the production of plants for which they rely on synthetic or chemical fertilizers. These chemicals boost the yield by over providing the nutrients to plants and maximizing their yield.  The nutrients are present naturally in the soil but get depleted when crops are grown on same patch of land without following crop rotation or inter cropping. Agrochemicals have adverse effect on the physiochemical properties of soil that is reduced soil fertility, soil pH imbalance, depletion in beneficial micro-organisms etc. Rain and floods of fields washes away these chemicals to water bodies causing water pollution. They do increase the crop growth and development but at the cost of environment. Biofertilizers are living or dormant microbes that promote the growth and development of crops when applied in soil and do not have any harmful effects like that of chemical fertilizers. They improve the growth and development of crops by mechanisms like siderophore production, nitrogen fixation, phytohormone production, potassium solubilization, phosphate solubilization etc., apart from it; biofertilizers are also capable of inducing plant growth promoting activities even under the biotic and abiotic stress. Biofertilizers also provide resistance against many diseases by producing antibiotics. This review sheds a light on biofertilizers, their mechanism and their impact on improving the crop production and soil health.