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Halophytes in biosaline agriculture: Mechanism, utilization, and value addition

Land is considered as the life‐sustaining platform for food and water. However, there are contaminants such as salt, heavy metal, and industrial waste that decrease land fertility, posing serious threat to sustainable agriculture. In recent years, novel crop varieties with improved tolerance against environmental contaminants have been developed, but most of them face severe yield penalty. Alternatively, naturally tolerant plants such as extremophiles can be screened for their potential as crops. These crops should be tolerant to various abiotic stresses, perform better under extreme conditions and produce higher biomass and yield. In view of this, the present review focuses on the effects of saline soil on plants and how a class of plants termed as “halophytes” can tolerate high levels of salt. The potential applications of halophytes in phytoremediation, desalination, secondary metabolite production, medicine, food, and saline agriculture have been discussed. A concept of saline agriculture has been proposed for rehabilitation of saline and degraded lands. In this context, a potential halophyte is cultivated in salt‐contaminated soil for desalination. The harvested halophyte can have industrial value, and later on, rehabilitated soil can be utilized for agriculture purpose. Some success with halophyte cultivation has been demonstrated in environmentally degraded soils, and it is imperative that large‐scale adoption of halophytes, as potential candidates, can be accorded top priority for rehabilitating contaminated soils, which can pave way for sustainable agriculture.