Nutritional deficits in humans and animals constitute a hidden epidemic in many impoverished areas across the world. The staple foods of developing South Asian and African nations, such as rice, wheat, and maize, are poor in micronutrients. In recent past, a lack of food diversification i.e., cereal-based crops low in minerals, is another danger to nutritional quality and security. Because of the inherently low-level accumulation of nutrients in cereal crops, they are the primary target for bio-fortification among all crops. Among different micronutrients, zinc (Zn) is an important micronutrient that plays a vital role in a variety of physiological functions, and its scarcity will result in lower crop yields and productivity. Agronomic practices like application of fertilizers in soil, nutri-priming, foliar spray etc. enhance the availability and uptake of Zn in crops. As a result, the growth and development, quality parameters and yield attributes of crop enhanced significantly. Therefore, agronomic biofortification of Zn in cereal crop is utmost important to achieve nutritional quality and food security. Furthermore, biofortification boosted the crop productivity to alleviate hidden hunger, in addition to quality aspects, proving to be a sustainable and cost-effective strategy. With soil and foliar fertiliser applications, including amendments, the agronomic interventions boost the Zn concentration in cereal crops. In this review the importance of agronomic Zn biofortification as a procedure to improve cereal yield and as an agricultural solution to solve nutritional quality and food security challenges is discussed.

A field experiment was conducted with 10 crop sequences as treatments to find out nutrient dynamics and nutrient uptake pattern. This study was laid out in randomized block design with three replications. Among the different cropping sequence taken under study, sudan fodder- berseem- cowpea fodder recorded highest nitrogen (443.6 kg/ha), phosphorus (146.8 kg/ha) and potassium (306.3 kg/ha) uptake followed by cowpea fodder- berseem- maize fodder with 411, 105.9 and 274 kg/ha nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium, respectively. Both these crop sequences showed negative nitrogen balance in soil. Meanwhile potassium balance was negative for most of the sequences. However, high value rice- capsicum - vegetable cowpea registered lowest nitrogen (134.5 kg/ha) and potassium uptake (129.20 kg/ha) leading to a positive nitrogen and potassium balance. Bangladesh J. Bot. 51(3): 607-613, 2022 (September)

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In the kharif season of 2020, an experimental trial was executed at Govind Ballabh Pant University of Agriculture and Technology which is situated in Pantnagar, India. The objective of this study was to evaluate how soybean's nutrient content and uptake responded to the application of thiourea through foliar means. The experiment was laid out in factorial randomized block design and comprised of two soybean cultivars viz., PS 1347 and SL 958 and five foliar sprays viz., control, water spray, thiourea spray @ 250 ppm, 500 ppm, and 750 ppm which were replicated four times. This study demonstrates the potential of foliar thiourea application to enhance the sulfur content and uptake of soybean cultivars in the kharif season. The findings of the study indicated that the N, P, and K content of soybean were not impacted by the type of variety used or by the foliar sprays administered. However, it was observed that the highest S content in both seeds (0.375%) and haulm (0.179%) was recorded when thiourea was applied through foliar means at a rate of 750 ppm. This result was statistically equivalent (0.368% in seed and 0.173% in haulm) to the outcome obtained from a 500 ppm foliar spray and both of these treatments were found to be more effective than the other foliar spray methods tested. Regarding the uptake of nutrients, it was observed that the highest levels of N, P, K, and S uptake by both seed and haulm as well as the total uptake, were recorded when a foliar spray containing 750 ppm of thiourea was used.