Plant nutrient management, among various production practices, plays a pivotal role in enhancing productivity

and quality of farm produce. Nitrogen being a dominant nutrient particularly in cereals, the main staple for majority,

occupies central role in crop nutrition to enhance productivity, but when used in excess pollutes precious ground water.

Various state of the art techniques in nitrogen nutrient recommendation aim to reduce fertilizer dose or tailor the supply of

nutrient for the target yield besides enhancing use efficiency of applied fertilizers to address cost effectiveness and

environmental concerns. Decision support tools, therefore, focus on real time plant nutrient supply as per crop needs. Leaf

colour chart (LCC) is a simple, cheap, and user friendly tool to manage N more precisely. Again, Chlorophyll meter (SPAD)

thresholds and optical sensors like GreenSeeker enable nutrient recommendation based on chlorophyll content, an indirect

measure of plant nitrogen content. The LCC threshold of 4 or 5 could be adopted to save 20-50 kg N/ha particularly in crops

with greater N demand or in crops grown under environment prone to N loss. The research carried out so far using these

techniques reveal that in addition to enhancement of productivity, agronomic, physiological and recovery efficiencies are

also improved in field crops. Therefore, there is a need to sensitize scientists, extension personnel, farmers and other

stakeholders on LCC, chlorophyll meters, optical sensors and various web based ready reckoners for effective nutrient

management in cereals.