Biocontrol Potential of Microbial Consortia: Approaches in Food Security and Disease Management

In the current scenario of climate change, the uncertainty of environmental factors and adverse impacts of chemical pesticides on the texture and productivity of soil along with increasing health concerns to humans appear as a global challenge in the management of agricultural yield to meet the food demand of burgeoning global populations. However, microbial consortia applied as either plant or soil inoculants have largely been used in the last few decades for the enhancement of agricultural productivity, improvement of nutrient status in the soil, improvement of fruit quality, and as biocontrol agents to control the growth of devastating phytopathogens during harvest or postharvest storage. The functional aspects of microbial consortia have been shown effective in broader ways as compared to individual cultures. Moreover, the efficiency of microbial consortia is higher due to the presence of several strains where each strain performs specific functions and shows better performance in functional behaviours in order to withstand environmental fluctuations. In this chapter, we have tried to compile the latest aspects and advancements in the development and application of microbial consortia for effective phytopathogen control so that the goals of food security could be achieved.