The Ancient Tea Horse Road and the Politics of Cultural Heritage in Southwest China: Regional Identity in the Context of
This chapter explores the multiple uses of cultural heritage as related to the “ancient tea horse road” (ATHR) of Southwest China, a network of trading routes linking tea producing regions of Yunnan and Sichuan with consumption markets in Tibet, Guangdong
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The Ancient Tea Horse Road and the Politics of Cultural Heritage in Southwest China: Regional Identity in the Context of a Rising China Gary Sigley
Introduction In 2005, a tea caravan (mabang 马邦) emerged out of the mists of time and made an epic journey from Yunnan to Beijing, from the “periphery” to the “center”.1 The caravan, consisting of forty muleteers and over one hundred mules, was transporting a precious four tonne cargo of pu’er tea cakes from the tea producing regions of southeast Yunnan to the capital of the People’s Republic. The tea was highly valued as “tribute tea” (gongcha 贡茶) calling to mind the time when precious commodities from across the empire made their way to the imperial court, and also reflecting in the present the rapacious demand for luxury and exotic goods among China’s nouveau riche (and also we might add as gifts to curry favor with those in positions of power). Pu’er tea, a distinctly Yunnanese form of broad leaf 1
There were two different caravans, one in 2005 travelling under the banner of “The Ancient Tea Horse Road Bearing Precious Tribute for the Capital” (chama gudao ruigong jingcheng 茶马 古道瑞贡京城), and one in 2006 that styled itself as “Caravan Tribute Tea Traversing the Endless Miles [to the capital]” (mabang gongcha wanlixing 马帮贡茶万里行). The money raised from the sale of the pu’er from the first caravan was donated to the well-known Communist Youth League charity “Project Hope” (xiwang gongcheng 希望工程). There were numerous reports in the Chinese media at the time. See: http://www.cnr.cn/minzu/mzdt1/200510/ t20051017_504116722.html accessed March 22, 2012; http://news.sina.com.cn/s/2005-08-18/ 03516717469s.shtml accessed March 22, 2012. The commercial value of these public relations and media events associated with the tea road and pu’er tea (even in the case of raising money for charity) was clearly revealed when the organizer of the first caravan attempted to sue the organizer of the second caravan for one million yuan for infringement of intellectual property. A Kunming court ultimately squashed the case declaring that no infringement had occurred. See: http://www.yndaily.com/html/20070612/news_93_184539.html accessed March 22, 2012. G. Sigley (&) Asian Studies, The University of Western Australia, 35 Stirling Highway, Crawley, WA 6009, Australia e-mail: [email protected]
T. Blumenfield and H. Silverman (eds.), Cultural Heritage Politics in China, DOI: 10.1007/978-1-4614-6874-5_12, Ó Springer Science+Business Media New York 2013
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tea (camellia sinensis assamica), and possibly the first variety of tea to be ever consciously cultivated (as opposed to the harvesting of wild trees), had only recently emerged from relative obscurity to become a hot item for Chinese investors looking for the next big thing to channel piles of idle cash (Zhang 2010). Pu’er tea, unlike most varieties of tea, is ideally suited to investment as it can be stored for decades and, depending on quality, will “improve” with age. Pu’er tea cakes (the tea is compressed into small di
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