An Overview of Planting, Research and Industrialization of International Millet Crops

Abstract

Millet crops are a general term of a class of annual crops with small grains, drought resistance, and barren resistance. Millets are mostly planted and consumed in developing countries in Asia and Africa. Foxtail millet and prosomillet are the most cultivated varieties in China. Governments of relatively developed countries in Asia, Europe and America pay more attention to scientific research and investment of millet crops rather than planting and consuming situation of that. The number of published papers on millet research supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China ranks first in the world, followed by that funded by European Commission, the UK Research and Innovation Agency, and the US National Science Foundation. However, in the last five years, India published the most of research papers, followed by China and the United States. Millets have many health benefits due to their richness in dietary fibers, proteins, minerals polyphenols, et al., so food science and technology and plant science have been becoming the hottest research areas on millet. Finally, we described some traditional and industrial millet products.

Keywords

• millets crops
• foxtail millet
• cultivation
• health benefits
• research area
• foundation grant
• industrialization