Sustainable tea plantations: Harnessing chemical-microbial synergy and smart application triangulation for targeted...

Over 200 weed species-predominantly from the Poaceae and Asteraceae families-infest tea plantations. These weeds compete aggressively with tea plants for essential resources (light, water, and nutrients), serve as reservoirs for pathogens and pests, and bioaccumulate phytotoxic compounds (e.g., pyrrolizidine alkaloids and heavy metals), jeopardizing agroecosystem health. Although chemical herbicides are currently the most effective and economical method, their long-term overuse poses ecological risks and threatens agricultural sustainability, highlighting an urgent need for sustainable alternatives. Although chemical herbicides remain the most effective and economical method, their long-term overuse causes ecological risks and challenges agricultural sustainability.

This review synthesizes current knowledge on sustainable weed management in tea plantations by evaluating the strengths and limitations of chemical and microbial herbicides. It further advances the novel concepts of chemical-microbial synergy and smart application triangulation-integrated strategies not explicitly addressed in previous reviews-that provide new directions for developing next-generation sustainable weed control.

This review systematically examines three critical aspects of weed management in tea plantations: (1) characterizing weed biodiversity and assessing multidimensional threats through taxonomic profiling of invasive species, with particular focus on their cascading impacts on tea agroecosystems including resource competition, disease transmission, and soil toxicity; (2) evaluating the mechanisms and trade-offs of current herbicide approaches through comparative analysis of chemical herbicides (noting their efficiency but ecological concerns) and microbial herbicides (considering their environmental benefits but field performance variability); (3) exploring sustainable optimization strategies by investigating innovative approaches such as precision herbicide formulations (nano-formulations, smart delivery systems) and integrated weed management solutions (microbiome engineering, epigenome editing).