Nutrient management in Rainfed-Dry Land Agro-Eco Systems in the impending climate change scenario.

In order to feed the burgeoning population there is urgent need to double the cereal crop production by the year 2050 and also to meet the United Nations Millennium Development Goals of reducing the number of hungry people to half by 2015 , there is utmost need to breed potentially high y ielding varieties to match up the requir~ment along with corrective measure to bridge the huge gap between attainable y ield (yield obtained in demonstration trials) and the average yield harvested by farmers. The Rainfed-Dry Land Agro-Eco Systems (RDLAES) has vast untapped potential to feed a major portion of population, currently sharing about 44 per cent of total foodgrain . production with bulk of (around 90 per cent) · coarse cereals, pulses and oilseeds of the nation. Under global wanning and climate change scenario the nutrient management in this fragile ecosystem of crop production could play vital and bigger role than ever as the response history of many of nutrient may not be as useful as they were in previous occasions obviously due to evolution i.n all the inputs and marked change in climate. It is estimated that organic and bio fertil izer may help to bridge this gap by , supplying 6-million tones of p lant nutrients, where as soils and efficient use of plant nutrients may contribute to the extent of three million tones. The INMS helps to restore and sustain soil fertility and crop productivity. It may also help to check the emerging deficiencies of nutrients other . than nitrogen, phosphorus and pot