A Review on Cyanobacterial Biofertilizer for Organic Rice Cultivation: Technology, Improvement and Future Prospects

High yielding varieties of rice are highly responsive to inorganic fertilizers. But, the excessive use of inorganic fertilizers can cause deterioration of agroecosystems by soil water leaching, killing of useful soil microbiota, denitrification, and volatilization. In this context, an alternative method of eco-friendly application of biofertilizers, has gained popularity in modern agriculture. Diazotrophic Cyanobacteria can be used effectively as a biofertilizer, owing to its nitrogen fixation capabilities and simultaneous production of a variety of growth promoting substances, secondary metabolites and other value-added products such as organic acids, ethanol, butanol, fatty acids and enzymes into the surrounding growth area, with immense potential within agriculture and other industries specify - also noting significant length of sentence, potential to be two sentences. The main constraint of cyanobacterial biofertilizer technology is the identification of an effective strain which would be able to sustain and adapt to various environmental conditions; as well as the establishment and optimisation of growth conditions and cultivation processes, including time, and method of application, etc. enhancing its effectiveness as a biofertilizer. Scientific effort should be expended for the identification of regional isolates including their method of effective adaptation to the specific agroecosystem. Since cyanobacteria are prokaryotic organisms with an absence of cell bound organelles, its genetic alteration is simple. Thus it provides a promising platform for genetic engineering of these organisms, which can be effectively exploited for nitrogen fixation as well as for the production of recombinant proteins.