Millets as an Integral Part of Nutritional Diet in India

Introduction

Millets are small grained cereals belonging to Gramineae family which include major millets like sorghum and pearl millet (which are tall growing and fairly drought tolerant) and minor millets with short slender culm and small grains possessing remarkable drought tolerance (ICRISAT and FAO, 1996). The term “millet’ is often used loosely to refer to several types of small seeded annual grasses. Millets share a set of characteristics which make them unique amongst cereals. They belong to five genera, namely Panicum, Setaria, Echinochola, Pennisetum, Paspalum, and Eleusine. The genus Pennisetum includes about 140 species, some of which are domesticated and some grow in the wild. Most of the genera are widely distributed throughout the tropics and subtropics of the world (De Wet et al, 1984). Millets can be a valuable source of forage because of their rapid growth, high nutritive value and ability to survive stressful conditions such as drought. According to Hulse et al. (1980), the most important cultivated millet species are pearl millet (Pennisetum typhoides), also known as bulrush millet; proso millet (Panicum miliaceum), also known as common millet; foxtail millet (Setaria italica); Japanese barnyard millet (Echinochloa crus- gallivar or E. colona); finger millet (Eleusine coracana), also known as birds foot millet or African millet and kodo millet (Paspalum scorbiculatum). Other millets include little millet (Panicum sumatrense), tef millet (Eargrostis tef) and fonio millet Digitaria exilis and D. iburua) (Dogget, 1989). The vernacular names of millets in India are given in Table 1.