Native to Northern and western South America. It is found in forests on the riverine flood plains, moist, wet, or sometimes rather dry forest, or in open places at elevations below 1,500 meters.    

Ice cream bean is an evergreen tree with a broad, spreading, moderately dense crown; it usually grows up to 20 meters tall, though specimens up to 30 meters have been recorded. The cylindrical bole is often contorted, it can be up to 60cm in diameter, often branching from near the base.

BARK: pale grey and smooth with pale elongated lenticels. The young twigs are angular in cross section and covered with fine short hairs.

LEAVES: once pinnate, up to 24 cm long with 4-6 pairs of opposite leaflets. The terminal pairs of leaflets are larger than the basal pair and can be up to 18cm long and 11cm wide. Between each leaflet, there is a nectary gland on the leaf rachis. The seedlings have a characteristic greyish sheen on the upper leaf surface.

FLOWERS: dense axillary, each consisting of a calyx tube with 5 lobes, a corolla tube with 5 lobes, and a large number of white stamens up to 4.5cm long, united in a tube in the lower half.

FRUIT: ribbed cylindrical pods, straight or often spirally twisted, up to 1m long. They contain fleshy green seeds in a sweet, white, cotton pulp.

Edible: fruit.

Medicine: leaves. http://tropical.theferns.info/viewtropical.php id=Inga+edulis

Agroforestry: planted as a shade tree in coffee and cacao plantations, fixes atmospheric nitrogen, leaves add considerable quantities of organic matter to the soil, soil erosion controller, provides fodder to the animals.

The wood is used for making packing cases, and especially for making piles.

The wood is used for fuel.