INNOVATIVE APPROACHES IN MEADOW- RANGELAND AND FORAGE CROPS

Forages are the basis of sustainable agriculture. They include a wide variety of plant species ranging from grasses and herbaceous legumes. Climate change has the potential to impact the quantity and reliability of forage production, quality of forage, water demand for cultivation of forage crops, as well as large-scale rangeland vegetation patterns. Abiotic stresses, factors limiting crop productivity and sustainability worldwide. Several agronomical and physiological mechanisms are involved in stress tolerance of crop plants. To alleviate the negative effects of environmental stresses, plants increase the production of various compatible osmolytes. This book summarizes the highlighting the importance of forage crops, the present improvements and some of future directions for enhancing yield and nutritional quality under environment stress conditions. Accordingly, Recent agricultural technologies that have greatly increased food supply have had inadvertent, detrimental impacts on the environment and on ecosystem services, highlighting the need for more sustainable agricultural production.