**2. Importance of millets in global agriculture**

#### **2.1. Economic benefits**

Barnyard millet [*Echinochloa frumetacea* Link], kodo millet [*Paspalum scrobiculatum* L.], little millet [*Panicum sumatrense* Roth ex Roem. & Schult.] and proso millet [*Panicum miliaceum* L.] (Table 1). Tef [*Eragrostis tef* (Zucc.) Trotter] was included in the millet group at the First Small Millets Workshop held 30 years ago in Bangalore, India [1], while both tef and fonio or acha [*Digitaria exilis* (Kippist) Stapf and *D. iburua* Stapf] were grouped under small millets by international agricultural organizations in the mid-1990s [2]. The inclusion of tef and fonio to the millet family is justifiable due to the close relationship of the two species with other millets. The genetic difference between some traditional millets is as large as that between tef or fonio and other millets. Due to this substantial variability among themselves, millets are grouped into two subfamilies, namely Panicoideae, which includes pearl millet, foxtail millets, Japanese barnyard millet and Indian millet, and to Chloridoideae, which includes finger millet and tef, and eight genera (Table 1). This indicates that finger millet which is normally grouped under millet is more closely related to tef than to other millets [3]. The divergence among traditional millets is also exhibited in the chromosome number and ploidy level which range from the diploid pearl millet (2*n* = 2*x* = 14) to the hexaploid fonio (2*n* = 6*x* = 54) [4, 5]. Millets are also divergent in the size and colour of seeds, seed weight, plant stature and shape of their panicles (Table 1). The geographical distributions of small millets were recently summarized by Goron and Raizada [6]. Except for finger millet, which is extensively cultivated in Africa and Asia,

**Traditional millets**

**millet**

*Echinochloa esculneta*

China

2n = 2x = 14 2n = 2x = 18 2n = 6x = 36 2n = 6x = 36 2n = 4x = 40

**Indian Barnyard millet**

> *Echinochloa frumetacea*

India, Pakistan, Nepal

anti-fungal Early maturity Drought tolerance

content

anti-diabetic High protein

**Kodo millet**

*Paspalum scrobiculatum*

High-quality protein

index, anti-oxidant

**Pearl millet Foxtail millet Japanese Barnyard**

Other names Bulrush millet Italian millet Japanese millet Billion dollar grass Koda millet

Subfamily Panicoideae Panicoideae Panicoideae Panicoideae Panicoideae Tribe Paniceae Paniceae Paniceae Paniceae Paniceae

Ploidy level Diploid Diploid Hexaploid Hexaploid Tetraploid

Purpose Food, feed Food, biofuel Food, feed Food Food, feed

Health benefits No gluten No gluten No gluten No gluten Low glycaemic

Reference [4, 20, 27] [16, 27] [5, 18, 27] [6] [27, 36]

tolerance Drought tolerance Early maturity,

other small millets are mainly grown in Asia.

640 Abiotic and Biotic Stress in Plants - Recent Advances and Future Perspectives

Botanical names *Pennisetum glaucum Setaria italica*

starch & minerals

Distribution Japan, Korea,

**Common name**

Chromosome number

Agronomic benefits Drought & heat

Nutritional benefits High protein,

Millets play a key role in the economy of the developing world especially in countries with extensive areas of marginal land used for crop cultivation. In 2013, the global area under millet cultivation was 34.9 million hectares, corresponding to 4.7 % of the global area for all cereals including wheat, maize and rice [7] (Table 2). On the other hand, the global production of millets in the same year was estimated to be 36.7 million tons, which contributes only 1.2% to the total cereal production. This lower production was due to the inferior average yield of millets (only 0.9 t ha–1) compared to other cereals (3.8 t ha–1). However, the contribution of India to global millet production is significant. In 2013, India produced over 30% of the global millet yield from only 25% of the global millet area, mainly due to improved productivity. In the same year, while the mean seed yield of millet in India was 1.2 t ha–1, it was only 0.8 t ha–1 for other countries. This 50% production advantage in India over other countries especially African countries was due to the widespread use of improved varieties and techniques. A decade ago, the rate of adoption of improved pearl millet cultivars by farmers was 65% in India but below 10% in some African countries [8].


a Traditional millets include finger millet, foxtail millet, Indian barnyard millet, Japanese barnyard millet, kodo millet, little millet, pearl millet and proso millet.

b Only for finger millet.

c Only for Ethiopia.

d Average global yield except for tef where it is the national average yield for Ethiopia.

**Table 2.** The top 20 millet-producing countries in the world in 2013.

Tef and fonio are exclusively cultivated in Africa. While fonio is cultivated on a total of half a million hectares in West Africa mainly in Guinea, Guinea-Bissau and Côte d'Ivoire [7], tef is grown in the Horn of Africa especially in Ethiopia where it is annually cultivated on three million hectares of land and is a staple food for about 50 million people [9]. In the last two decades, the productivity of tef was raised by 100%, from just 0.7 t ha–1 in 1994 to 1.4 t ha–1 in 2013 mainly due to an increase in the use of improved cultivars.

In general, millets play a key role in food security in Asia and Africa. Together with sorghum, millets account for about half of the total cereal production in Africa [10]. Millets, are therefore considered as a poor man's crop due to their significant contributions to the diet of resourcelimited farmers and consumers.
