It is native to Southern Chinese regions including Sichuan, Guizhou, Yunnan, and Fujian as well as Taiwan and other Southeast Asian countries such as Indonesia, Malaysia and Cambodia.

It produces a fruit which is processed for its lemony essential oil.

The oil can also be extracted from the leaf, but this is considered to be lower in quality.

[1] It is mainly produced in China from plantations and is marketed as "Litsea cubeba", with production estimates between 500 and 1,500 tonnes of oil per annum.

It is also used as a raw material by the chemical industry for the synthesis of vitamin A and violet-like fragrances.