No abstract

Over the past few years, many cultivated plants have been under scrutiny for their potential role in economic, agroecological, nutritional, and scientific innovation sectors, especially in various developing countries. This was aimed to identify plants that have the potential to alleviate food insecurity, improve agroecosystems while benefiting the producers financially as well. Such important crops have been studied and are continuously undergoing improvements to produce cultivars that confer biotic and abiotic stress tolerance, enhanced shelf-life, nutritional quality, and environmental benefits. This chapter reviews the benefits provided by globally cultivated legumes, the challenges faced during their propagation, the methods used to enhance these crops, and the constraints they undergo during genetic improvement. It further analyses the strategies that have been employed thus far to optimise genetic transformation.