Biofortification of Wheat: A Sustainable Strategy to Combat Micronutrient Deficiency

Abstract

Biofortification is an urgently sustainable, and cost-effective farming policy which aims at reducing the prevalent zinc and iron deficiencies, also referred to as hidden hunger, among the two billion individuals on the earth. Wheat being a major global dietary crop consumed by large population has become an ideal and useful target to increase micronutrient dietary intake. This effort is being undertaken in three main, complementary methods namely agronomic, genetic and transgenic biofortification. Agronomic biofortification, which entails the use of soil or foliar micro-fertilizers, is an expediency to increase the nutrient content of grain but the impact is usually conditional upon its continued use. On the contrary, genetic biofortification takes advantage of natural genetic variation of wheat germplasm. The high yield varieties with constitutively increased levels of zinc and iron in the grain developed through traditional and molecular marker assisted breeding offer an unchanging and inherit-able corrective measure. In cases where there is no or very little natural genetic variation of these traits, transgenic and gene-editing technologies have proven most useful. Through these methods, it is possible to highly adjust genes that are related to nutrient uptake in soil, translocation in plant and storage in the edible grain endosperm. Of paramount importance, the way out that has the greatest potential is an integrated approach that leverages on the advantages of all the three approaches.