Jingmai Mountain Ancient Tea Forest Cultural Landscape — UNESCO World Heritage List

The Allure of Jingmai Tea

The magic of Jingmai Tea lies in its "sweet first, then alive" sensory journey. With the first gentle sip, a crisp, rock-sugar sweetness arrives, instantly transforming into a lingering, enveloping sweetness that resonates in the throat like a mountain breeze drifting through the forest. Though a subtle astringency appears at first, it acts like the perfect finishing touch — within seconds it dissolves into a surge of sweetness, lending the tea a vibrant, living quality. Even after fifteen infusions, the flavour remains as rich and full as the first; the final water is sweet and refreshing as mountain spring water, affirming its reputation as the "king of endurance".

The traditional sun-drying process locks in the tea's vitality, offering infinite potential for future transformation. Rich in tea polyphenols and amino acids, Jingmai Tea offers antioxidant, lipid-reducing, and stomach-nourishing benefits — a pleasure for the palate and a treasure for wellness alike. These leaves, imbued with the soul of the rainforest, carry the civilisational memory of the thousand-year Tea Horse Road. Today, they continue to write new legends with their mellow fragrance, inviting you to savour the finest flavours that time and nature have crafted together. From the ancient villages of a thousand years to the clear tea in your cup, Jingmai Tea uses fragrance as its brush and mountains and rivers as its ink, writing a legend where nature and humanity are one. Take a sip, and you will understand what it means to say: "The true taste of tea is found in Jingmai."

The soul of Jingmai Mountain lies not only in its tea, but in the thousand-year covenant between humanity and nature. The Dai and Bulang peoples have guarded the ancient tea gardens for generations, weaving the rituals of tea picking and processing into their seasonal festivals, giving rise to unique cultural symbols such as the "Tea Ancestor Ceremony" and the "Sankang Tea Ancestor Festival". The stilt-style architecture of the ancient villages harmonises beautifully with the tea forests, and in the old tea pots simmering beside the hearth, the life stories passed down through generations continue to bubble and brew.

A Unique Landscape That Vividly Embodies the Outstanding Characteristics of Chinese Civilisation

From approximately the 10th to the 14th century, the ancestors of the Bulang and Dai peoples migrated to this land in succession, discovered wild tea tree communities growing in the forest, and chose to settle and build their villages here. Through long years of exploration, they gradually came to understand the productive characteristics of Pu-erh tea trees. They discovered that by selectively felling a small number of tall trees within the forest to plant tea trees, a layered community structure of "canopy layer — tea tree layer — herbaceous layer" could be formed, creating ideal conditions of light, temperature, and humidity for the tea trees to thrive. The forest's natural ecosystem not only protects the tea trees from pests and diseases, but also provides natural nutrients, enabling the sustainable production of high-quality organic tea. This technique of cultivating land within the forest and planting beneath the canopy, pioneered by the ancient inhabitants, represents the crystallisation of wisdom from China's agricultural civilisation. Over a thousand years of protection and development, it has gradually given rise to the unique cultural landscape of forest and tea coexisting in harmony between humanity and the land.

A Unique System for the Protection and Management of Ancient Tea Forests

UNESCO determined that the "Pu-erh Jingmai Mountain Ancient Tea Forest Cultural Landscape" meets World Heritage Criteria iii and v, reflecting a unique system for the protection and management of ancient tea forests that combines government administration with grassroots self-governance, built upon a foundation of traditional Tea Ancestor beliefs. This system fully respects local climatic conditions, topographical features, and flora and fauna populations, achieving the protection of cultural and biological diversity alongside the sustainable use of natural resources. The heritage site also demonstrates the unique and original traditions of the Bulang, Dai, and other indigenous peoples in their complementary use of natural resources within a mountainous environment. The villages and traditional residential buildings that form part of the heritage site further reflect, in their siting, layout, and architectural style, the diverse cultural traditions and the understanding and utilisation of the ecological environment.

Li Qun, Vice Minister of Culture and Tourism and Director of the National Cultural Heritage Administration, expressed gratitude to the World Heritage Committee and the International Council on Monuments and Sites, and conveyed the joy and excitement of the Chinese people at the successful inscription of the "Pu-erh Jingmai Mountain Ancient Tea Forest Cultural Landscape" on the UNESCO World Heritage List. He noted that the site embodies a simple ecological ethic of respecting nature and protecting forests, contains a traditional agricultural knowledge system of adapting to local conditions and pursuing green development, and carries a multi-ethnic social governance philosophy of peace, friendship, openness, and inclusivity — vividly demonstrating the outstanding characteristics of Chinese civilisation.