The orange tree is one of the most cultivated fruit trees in the world.

Native to Asia, although these is debate regarding its origin location, the orange arrived in Europe in Middle Ages, tasted in that period by only emperors, nobles and ecclesiastics . The orange was introduced in Brazil by the Portuguese immigrants in the beginning of the 16 ^th century. The most ancient reference about the orange in Brazil is from 1540 and points the island of "Cananéia" as the birthplace of Brazilian citrus production (" Laranja & Cia. " and " A Laranja no Brasil" , Hasse, SP, 1987).

Several ancient reports about Brazil mention the orange trees, giving special importance to the quality and taste of our fruit as unique.

Jumping to the 20 ^th century, the 1930’s were very important for orange in Brazil. The decline of coffee culture provided room for the development of citrus production and in that decade oranges were already one of the ten most important Brazilian export products. However, with the Second World War the export markets were blocked and the citrus cultivation felt its first impact, which was turned around with the ending of the war and with the restart of exports. Since then, the orange neither lost its position nor its vital importance for Brazilian economy especially with the establishment of juice processing plants.

A country with favorable climatic characteristics for the development of orange culture, Brazil is nowadays the largest producer and exporter of orange juice and its byproducts in the world.  All this resulted from a continual development of areas for citrus cultivation with the use of modern technology making the Brazilian orange at the top ranking of worldwide preference.

Map illustrating the trajectory around the world