Frutal is a municipality in the west of the Brazilian state of

Minas Gerais Minas Gerais () is a state in Southeastern Brazil. It ranks as the second most populous, the third by gross domestic product (GDP), and the fourth largest by area in the country. The state's capital and largest city, Belo Horizonte (literall ...

. The population, estimated in 2020 by the

IBGE The Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics ( pt, Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatística; IBGE) is the agency responsible for official collection of statistical, geographic, cartographic, geodetic and environmental informati ...

, is of 60,012 inhabitants. The city has an area of 2,427km². Frutal is located in the region known as the "

Triângulo Mineiro The Triângulo Mineiro (, ''Mineiro Triangle'') is the region that comprises the west part of the state of Minas Gerais, in Brazil. It occupies an area of 93,500 km2 (slightly larger than Portugal or Hungary) and is bordered to the east by Serra ...

Microregion of Frutal

Frutal is the seat of a statistical microregion with 12 municipalities:

Campina Verde Campina Verde is a municipality in the north of the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais. the population was 19,752 in a total area of 3,663 km². It became a municipality in 1938. Location Campina Verde is located at an elevation of 530 meter ...

Carneirinho Carneirinho is a municipality in the westernmost tip of the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais. Due to its location, it is the only municipality in Minas Gerais to border the state of Mato Grosso do Sul. the population was 10,066 in a total area of 2 ...

, Comendador Gomes, Fronteira, Frutal, Itapagipe, Iturama, Limeira do Oeste, Pirajuba, Planura,

São Francisco de Sales São Francisco de Sales is a municipality in the west of the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais. As of 2020 the population was 6,274 in a total area of 1,129 km². It became a municipality in 1962. Location São Francisco de Sales belongs to ...

, and

União de Minas União de Minas is a municipality in the west of the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais. Location União de Minas belongs to the statistical micro-region of Frutal. It is located at an elevation of 521 meters between the São Domingos River and the ...

. In 2010 the population of this region was 179,512 inhabitants. The area is 16,840 km², with a population density of 10.66 inhabitants/km².

Location

The city is located at an elevation of 485 meters just north of the Grande River, a tributary of the

Paraná River The Paraná River ( es, Río Paraná, links=no , pt, Rio Paraná, gn, Ysyry Parana) is a river in south-central South America, running through Brazil, Paraguay, and Argentina for some ."Parana River". Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Br ...

. It is 8 km east of federal highway

BR-153 BR-153 is a major federal highway of Brazil, officially named the Transbrasiliana Highway. It also serves as part of the Belém–Brasília Highway in the stretch located between the cities of Wanderlândia, in the state of Tocantins, and An� ...

(Transbrasiliana). Neighboring municipalities are: *Northwest: Itapagipe *North: Comendador Gomes *Northeast:

Campo Florido Campo Florido is a Brazilian municipality located in the west of the state of Minas Gerais. Its population was estimated to be 8,269 people living in a total area of 1,261 km². The city belongs to the mesoregion of Triângulo Mineiro and Al ...

*West: Itapagipe *East: Orindiúva, São Paulo *Southwest: Orindiúva and Paulo de Faria, São Paulo *South: Guaraci, São Paulo and Fronteira *Southeast:

Colômbia Colômbia is a municipality in the northern part of the state of São Paulo in Brazil. The population is 6,216 (2020 est.) in an area of 728.65 km². The elevation is 492 m. The bounding municipalities are Barretos to the south and Guaíra to the ...

and

Barretos Barretos is a municipality in the northern part of the state of São Paulo, Brazil. The city has approximately 122,833 inhabitants ( IBGE/2020) and an area of 1566.1 km². Barretos belongs to the Mesoregion of Ribeirão Preto. History The ...

, São Paulo Distances * Belo Horizonte: 600 km. *

Uberaba Uberaba () is a city in the state of Minas Gerais, southeast Brazil. It is located in the Brazilian Highlands at above sea level on the Uberaba River, and away from the state capital, Belo Horizonte. The city status was granted in 1856, and ...

: 145 km. *

Uberlândia Uberlândia () is a municipality in the state of Minas Gerais, southeastern Brazil. It is the second largest municipality in the state of Minas Gerais after the state capital Belo Horizonte. Its population in 2020 was 699,097, making it the fo ...

: 186 km. * Planura: 32 km.

Economic activities

The most important economic activities are cattle raising, commerce, light industry, food processing, and agriculture. The GDP in 2008 was R$ 692,216,000. Frutal is in the top tier of municipalities in the state with regard to economic and social development. As of 2007 there were 06 banking agencies in the town. There was a dynamic retail infrastructure serving the surrounding area of cattle and agricultural lands. In the rural area there were 1,574 establishments occupying about 3,800 workers. 530 of the farms had tractors, a ratio of one in three. There were 10,726 automobiles in all of the municipality, about one for every 9 inhabitants. Frutal is an important agricultural producer and a large producer of meat and dairy products. There were 157,000 heads of cattle in 2006, of which 53,000 head were dairy cows. The crops with a planted area of more than 100 hectares were: *sugarcane: 10,128 ha. *rubber: 628 ha. *oranges: 6,500 ha. *pineapple: 1,600 ha. *corn: 5,000 ha. *soybeans: 27,000 ha. *sorghum: 5,000 ha.

Health and education

In the health sector there were 04 hospitals with 133 beds and 10 public health clinics. In the educational sector there were 13 municipal, 06 state, and 06 private primary schools. There were 4 state and 3 private middle schools. In higher education there were three institutes: ITECON - Instituto Superior de Educação Continuada; UEMG - Universidade do Estado de Minas Gerais; FAF - Faculdade Frutal. *Municipal

Human Development Index The Human Development Index (HDI) is a statistic composite index of life expectancy, Education Index, education (mean years of schooling completed and expected years of schooling upon entering the Educational system, education system), ...

: 0.803 (2000) *State ranking: 32 out of 853 municipalities as of 2000 *National ranking: 495 out of 5,138 municipalities as of 2000 *Literacy rate: 91% *Life expectancy: 74.7 (average of males and females) The highest ranking municipality in Minas Gerais in 2000 was

Poços de Caldas Poços de Caldas is a municipality in the south of Minas Gerais state, Brazil, in the microregion of the same name. Its estimated population in 2020 was 168,641 inhabitants. The city is known for its hot springs. History Poços was founded in 1 ...

with 0.841, while the lowest was

Setubinha Setubinha is a municipality in the northeast of the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais. As of 2020 the population was 12,378 in a total area of 536 km². The elevation is 729 metres. It is part of the IBGE statistical microregion of Teófilo ...

with 0.568. Nationally the highest was

São Caetano do Sul São Caetano do Sul (or São Caetano) ('' Saint Cajetan of the South''. ) is a city in São Paulo state in Brazil. It is part of the Metropolitan Region of São Paulo. The population is 161,957 (2020 est.) in an area of 15.33 km2. It is the c ...

in São Paulo with 0.919, while the lowest was Setubinha. In more recent statistics (considering 5,507 municipalities) Manari in the state of

Pernambuco Pernambuco () is a state of Brazil, located in the Northeast region of the country. With an estimated population of 9.6 million people as of 2020, making it seventh-most populous state of Brazil and with around 98,148 km², being the ...

has the lowest rating in the country—0,467—putting it in last place.

Origin of the Name and History

According to oral tradition the name of the city is linked to the abundance of a fruit similar to the

jabuticaba Jabuticaba is the edible fruit of the jabuticabeira (''Plinia cauliflora'') or Brazilian grapetree. The purplish-black, white-pulped fruit grows directly on the trunk of the tree. It is eaten raw or used to make jellies, jams, juice or wine. The ...

, which was known by the first settlers as only "fruit". As a result, the place was called Patrimônio das Frutas, later as Carmo do Fructal and today only Frutal. The first registers mention the arrival of a pioneer Antônio de Paula e Silva in 1835, who settled with his family and slaves on the banks of the Rio Grande. In 1850 the settlement was declared a "arraial" or village, and in 1858 it was raised to the status of district in the municipality of

, becoming emancipated in the same year with the name of Carmo do Fructal. In 1887 it became a city with the name Frutal.{{Cite web , url=http://www.frutal.mg.gov.br/cidade/historia.html , title=City government site , access-date=2008-06-13 , archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070123230827/http://www.frutal.mg.gov.br/cidade/historia.html , archive-date=2007-01-23 , url-status=dead

References