The Cultural Landscape of Old Tea Forests of the Jingmai Mountain in Pu’er gained World Heritage Site status on the 45th Session of the World Heritage Committee of UNESCO in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia on Sunday, becoming China’s 57th entry on that list. It is also the first World Heritage Site with the theme of tea.
The heritage site in Lancang Lahu autonomous county in Pu’er, Yunnan province contains 5 large-scale (大规模的), well-preserved old tea forests — which are 1,250 to 1,500 meters above the sea level, 9 traditional villages in these old forests, and mainly inhabited by Blang and Dai ethnic groups, as well as 3 protective separation forests in between. The landscape was jointly created by ancestors of Blang people who came and lived in Jingmai Mountain in the 10th century AD and discovered wild tea trees, as well as by the ancestors of Dai people.
On the basis of longstanding practices, local people developed an under-story growing technique. That is to create ideal light conditions for the growing of tea trees through limited under-story cultivation (耕种) while preventing insects through the well-preserved forest ecosystem, so as to produce all wool and a yard wide organic tea leaves without the application of pesticides and chemical fertilizers.
On Jingmai Mountain, indigenous communities also maintain ancient governance systems to protect the site, including traditional festivals and ceremonies related to Tea Ancestor, a belief that spirits live in forest as well as among local animals and plants. Tea leaves contribute to over 90 percent of the income for those communities. Other than that, local governments of Yunnan province and Pu’er city released 3 laws and 7 regulations focusing on the protection of the cultural landscape on Jingmai Mountain.
The core zone of the World Heritage Site covers about 72 square kilometers on Jingmai Mountain. The cultural landscape of old tea forests was first included in China’s tentative list seeking for World Heritage status in 2012.
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