Studies conducted by the Phytochemistry Group of the Botany Department identified a species native to the Amazon region commonly known as pimenta longa, a plant that is characterized by high safrole content in its essential oils. The natural safrole is an important compound in the pharmaceutical and insecticide industries. In preliminary studies it was verified that the essential oil is contained, preferentially, in the thin branches and leaves of the plant. The present work aims to verify the percentage of essential oil in different organs of the plant: secondary branches (leaves and thin branches) and main branches (apical, middle and basal parts) in order to establish how this raw material will be benefited when commercially treated. All collected material was previously recorded and observed for wet weight, dry weight, and plant height. The drying was done in a period of 7 days at room temperature. The weight of the material for analysis was 25g for each part of the plant, submitted to a period of 3 hours of continuous steam distillation to obtain the essential oil yield and 5g of the sample to determine its humidity. The results obtained showed that from the secondary branches, the leaves had an average yield of 4% in essential oil and the thin branches had around 0.6%; from the main branches, the apical part obtained a low yield, around 0.2%, and the other parts had an insufficient yield for the reading. In the commercial exploitation of long pepper it is evident that both the median part of the stem and its basal part can be neglected, considering the absence of essential oil. Otherwise, if all the raw material of the plant is processed, there will be a loss of time, equipment wear and yield in essential oil.
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