Millets important source of nutrition: experts

To educate industry stakeholders and farmers about millet crops, experts highlighted importance of the crop with regard to nutrition and other aspects.
The summit was organised by Action for Social Advancement in collaboration with Biodiversity International, Rome, to sensitise key stakeholders about millet crops with regard to its nutrition, climate change mitigation value, and importance for agro- biodiversity, a release said here today.
At the National Summit & Millet Gala here, Nutritionist Dr Swarna Vyas spoke about the iron deficiency and infertility problems which can be tackled with minor millets.
Various issues related to the declining production area of millets, stagnating productivity and poor value chain development were also raised at the summit, it said.

However, there has been positive signals of growing awareness and consumption of millets by the urban middle class due to its high nutritive value.
Former Agriculture Production Commissioner of Madhya Pradesh, M M Upadhyaya stressed the need of millet related research and active extension work for improved milled farming practises among the farmers.

"Millets can grow in poor quality soil and create a good plan B for food security. With the growing population and the climate change scenario food security may become an issue in the future," Dr Dayakar Rao of Indian Institute of Millet Research, Hyderabad, said.
The summit was attended by participants from government, agriculture universities, NGOs, private sectors.

Village resource persons from Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Tamil Nadu, engaged in promoting millets as a source of nutrition among children, tribal population especially women and farmers, also took part in the seminar.