Camellia oleifera Abel, belonging to the Theaceae family, Camellia L. The plant, for evergreen small trees or shrubs, is a unique woody edible oil species in China, oil tea has a long history of cultivation in China. Zhang Zongfa [Qing Dynasty] (1700) in the book of Three farmers "quoted" the book of Mountains and seas ", "members of wood, oil food in the south", "members of wood" is oil tea. It can be seen that Chinese people have a history of more than 2,300 years of extracting oil from camellia seeds for consumption. According to research, the name of oil tea has different expressions in various general Chronicles. In addition to the current commonly known as "oil tea", there are tea, tea oil tree, camellia, Nanshan tea, spies and 槮 and other nicknames. In the Northern Song Dynasty, Su Song's book Tujing Materia Medica gave a detailed description of the character, origin and utility of oil tea. It is recorded in the "Tongzhi" written by Zheng Qiao in the Southern Song Dynasty that "more trees are planted in the soil of the southern mountains", which proves that oil tea has reached the development stage of mass cultivation at that time. In the late Ming Dynasty, Wang Xiangjin's "Qunfang Spectrum" and Xu Guangqi's "The Book of Agricultural Administration", the selection, seed storage, seedling rearing, land preparation and afforestation of cameltea were explained in detail. "Three rural records" recorded: "Dig the ground for a small cellar, do not pass deep, with sand and solid cellar, the next year when the spring equinox opened the cellar sowing." These methods are still used everywhere today. The records of "love yellow soil and hate dampness" and "harvest means planting and fertilizing soil" of camellia oil in the record of "Sannong" are completely consistent with the characteristics of camellia oil. Xu Guangqi's "The Book of Agricultural Politics" also recorded the benefits of tea oil and oil mixed with Tong, "the seed of Tong, will be planted camellia, tung seeds, tea seeds sheng, cycle phase generation, more than chestnut return and long." In addition, in the "Qunfang Spectrum" and "Nongzheng Shu", also recorded in detail the time and method of harvesting and processing of oil tea. It can be seen that our country has a long history and rich experience in cultivating oil tea. The cultivation and utilization experience of oil tea drawn from the treasure house of ancient literature is still of reference significance for the development of oil tea industry today.

Oil tea originated in China, except for Japan and a few countries in Southeast Asia have sporadic distribution, only China has a large area of cultivation, it can be said that oil tea is a treasure given by nature to the land of China. Nowadays, the oil tea resources have been well protected and developed, and the oil tea industry has taken off, which will provide high-quality edible oil for China and the world.