Anand Kumar, Vikas Kumar, Ankit Agrawal and Rashmi Verma
Abstract
Conventional agriculture technology plays an important role to fulfill the food demands for the growing human population. But utilization of chemical fertilizers and pesticides is increasing very fast in recent time for enhancing production level. The extensive use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides is the main cause of air, soil and ground water pollution. Plant-associated microbes have marvelous potential to develop plant flexibility and production in farming systems. Therefore the aim of this chapter is to focus on importance and use of plant growth promoting bacteria for the sustainable agriculture. Using this approach the efforts have been made for the production of high quality nutrient rich food under the consideration of bio-safety. As per the previous research, some microbes or their metabolites can enhance production, diminish plant stress responses and also works as a bio control agent. In spite of this, their efficacy and stability under the broad range of conditions need to be improved. For the optimization of microbial bio pesticides and biofertilizers, lots of research still has to be done. Therefore these approaches can maximize benefits and can significantly improve crop production to address food security.