ABSTRACT
One of the largest industries in the world is agriculture, and it is also the main contributor to diseases that affect human health due to the excessive use of antibiotics. The use of antimicrobials in food production and agriculture has a direct or indirect impact on the emergence of bacteria linked to plants and animals that may enter the food chain through the consumption of meat, fish, vegetables, or other food sources. Antibiotic resistance, or AMR, is a severe threat to public health systems around the world because of the overuse of antibiotics. The failure of antibiotics to treat infectious diseases portends uncertainty for the future of healthcare. Furthermore, spontaneous evolution, bacterial mutation, and the transmission of resistant genes via horizontal gene transfer are significant contributors to antimicrobial resistance. Numerous routes related to agriculture, including wastewater, soils, manure applications, direct contact between people and animals, and food intake, can result in the transmission of AMR bacteria and genes across systems. Through the complex network of the agricultural ecology, antibiotics, antibiotic resistance bacteria, and antibiotic resistance genes ultimately enter the food chain, leading to unpredictable health consequences in humans. Since various farming techniques and market niches may individually have a unique influence on the growth and proliferation of antibiotic resistance, the situation in the agricultural ecosystem is more challenging. This review focuses on antimicrobial resistance in agriculture, its detection techniques, how it affects human health, and several countermeasures that can be taken to combat antimicrobial resistance.
