Ficus is a pan-tropical genus of about 850 species of woody trees, shrubs, vines, epiphytes and hemi-epiphytes in the family Moraceae. Ficus occupies a wide variety of ecological niches; most are evergreen, but some deciduous species are endemic to areas outside of the tropics and to higher elevations. Fig species are characterized by their unique inflorescence and distinctive pollination syndrome, which utilizes wasp species belonging to the Agaonidae family for pollination. The fruit of most species are edible though they are usually of only local economic importance or eaten as bushfood. However, they are extremely important food resources for wildlife. Figs are also of considerable cultural importance throughout the tropics, both as objects of worship and for their many practical uses.

Ficus obliqua, synonymously known as Ficus eugenioides and commonly known as Small-leaved Fig, is a banyan type evergreen fig tree that is native to eastern Australia, New Guinea, eastern Indonesia to Sulawesi and islands in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. Beginning life as a seedling, which grows on other plants (epiphyte) or on rocks (lithophyte), Ficus obliqua can grow to 60m tall and nearly as wide with a pale grey buttressed trunk, and glossy green leaves. The small round yellow fruit ripen and turn red at any time of year, attracting fruit eating birds to the garden. Ficus obliqua is an elegant shade tree for parks, gardens or fields and is adaptable to differing soils. It is also suited for use as an indoor plant in low-, medium- or brightly lit indoor spaces. Medicinally its white sap has been used for painful or swollen joints and limbs or boils or diluted with water and drunk to improve breast milk. Liquid extracted from the root bark has been used for headaches or, when diluted, to improve health after childbirth, and the leaves are applied to venereal lesions. The species has been traditionally used for boils in Samoa and Tonga.