Trchoderma Spp.: Their Impact in Crops Diseases Management

Trichoderma species, a cosmopolitan fungi, present in all types of soil, manure, and decaying plant tissues that can degrade domestic waste relatively quickly without emitting bad odors. Trichoderma is recognized worldwide as potential fungal bio-control agents for the management of various foliar and soil-borne plant pathogens, highly compatible with sustainable agriculture and play major role as a component of integrated pest management. Bio-control agents are an antagonism and eco-friendly approach for managing plant diseases. Trichoderma as bioagent area effective not only against soil-borne plant pathogens, but also against nematodes without any adverse effect on beneficial microbes. Trichoderma is capable of growth promotions in crops. There are two major mass production methods of Trichoderma spp. viz., solid state fermentation and liquid state fermentation. In solid, fungus is grown on various cereal grains, agricultural wastes, and byproducts, and these products are used mainly for direct soil application to suppress the soil-borne inoculums. In a liquid state, Trichoderma is grown on media such as molasses and yeast in deep tanks and fermentation can be made into different formulations such as dusts, granules, pellets, wettable powders. As seed-treating agents or bio-priming agents, Trichoderma formulations can be successfully used against several soil-borne diseases caused by Pythium, Phytophthora, Rhizoctonia, Fusarium and Sclerotium, spp. in several crops.