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The Decline and the Rebirth of the Tea-Horse Road in China

The Tea-Horse route between China and Tibet received an unexpected boost in the mid-20th century, following the full-scale outbreak of war between Japan and China in 1937, and more particularly after the outbreak of World War II in the Pacific following Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbour in December, 1941. Within months of launching this attack, Japanese forces had overrun much of Southeast Asia and invaded the then-British colony of Burma, cutting the ‘Burma Road’ – China’s military and economic lifeline in the anti-Japanese struggle – at the Lashio railhead, and forcing the Allies to supply Chiang Kai-shek’s Kuomintang forces by air across the eastern Himalayas, flying ‘The Hump’ between airfields in Assam and Kunming in China. The Ledo Road

This military disaster caused the Allies to start building the ‘Ledo Road’ between the railhead at Ledo in Assam and the southern terminus of the Burma Road at Lashio, an undertaking characterised by Winston Churchill as ‘an immense, laborious task, unlikely to be finished until the need for it has passed’. In fact, the Ledo Road was completed in late 1944, and the first convoy between Assam and China reached Kunming in February, 1945, just six months before Japan’s unconditional surrender.

The construction of the Burma and Ledo roads helped substantially to diminish the importance of the India-China trade via Sikkim and Tibet, but not before the Japanese invasion had caused a final, memorable surge in traffic eastwards along the old caravan route. Peter Goullart, a Russian resident of Lijiang in the 1940s, records that, as a result of the war: ‘an unprecedented caravan trade developed… between Lhasa and Lijiang’. According to Goullart, at the height of what he terms ‘Operation Caravan’, no fewer than 8,000 mules and 20,000 yaks were employed to carry supplies along the venerable Tea-Horse Road. His unique account is worth quoting at some length:

‘Sewing-machines, textiles, cases of the best cigarettes, both British and American, whiskies and gins of famous brands, dyes and chemicals, kerosene oil in tins, toilet and canned goods and a thousand and one varieties of small articles started flowing in an unending stream by rail and truck [from Calcutta] to Kalimpong, to be hastily repacked and dispatched by caravan to Lhasa. There the flood of merchandise was crammed into the halls and courtyards of the palaces and lamaseries and turned over to an army of sorters and professional packers. The least fragile goods were set aside for the northern route to Tachienlu [Kangding], to be transported by yaks: other articles were packed for delivery at Lijiang, especially the liquors and cigarettes which were worth their weight in gold in Kunming, crowded with thirsty American and British troops…Few people have realized how vast and unprecedented this sudden expansion of caravan traffic between India and China was, or how important’. This was to be, however, the ‘last hurrah’ of the traditional Tea-Horse Road, which would soon be rendered obsolete by a combination of a political sea-change and road construction. In 1949 Mao Zedong’s communists seized power in China, and in 1950-51 the communist People’s Liberation Army (PLA) advanced into Tibet, restricting free trade and severely limiting traffic across the Nathu La pass with India. Over the following decades, Beijing began to build a series of major national highways, including Highway 318 (5,334 km) between Shanghai and Zhanmuzhen on the Tibetan frontier with Nepal (1954) and Highway 214 (3,345 km) between Xishuangbanna in Yunnan and Xining in Qinghai (1974). Following the completion of such all-weather, surfaced highways, the Ancient Tea-Horse Road to Tibet soon became effectively redundant.

Following the economic reforms introduced by Deng Xiaoping in the 1980s and the gradual abandonment of a socialist command economy in favour of a de facto free market, China has become increasingly rich and its people – within the constraints of continuing Communist Party political control – increasingly free. One interesting consequence of this transformation has been the rebirth of the ancient Tea-Horse Road, albeit in a new guise.

To be sure, the people of Tibet still drink a great deal of butter tea, and the tea plantations of Yunnan and Sichuan now produce more and better quality tea than at any time in their history. But this produce now travels overland to Lhasa and beyond by truck, along paved roads. Except in the most remote of rural areas, the mule caravan has had its day.

And yet, unexpectedly, the fame of the ancient Tea-Horse Road is currently experiencing a revival that shows no sign of diminishing. In the increasingly rich and sophisticated cafes and teashops of Shanghai and Beijing, as well as a world away in cities like New York and San Francisco, London, Paris and Melbourne, Pu’er tea is enjoying an explosion of popularity, both for its taste and for its much-vaunted health-enhancing qualities – as an aid in digestion, in reducing blood pressure, cholesterol and lipid levels, in slimming and as an anti-carcinogenic, not to mention as a cure for hangovers.

Of course, there’s no need to go to San Francisco or Shanghai to experience the Pu’er tea phenomenon. In Yunnan, Sichuan and Tibet the history, taste and health-promoting qualities of Pu’er are increasingly celebrated, with a plethora of tea shops and restaurants aimed primarily at Chinese tourists and customers, but also at overseas visitors. In the Yunnanese capital of Kunming, for example, two of the most popular hotels for visitors are called ‘The Hump’, and ‘The Camellia’, and the latter – which is rendered Cha Hua or ‘Tea Flower’ in Chinese – boasts a Cha Ma ‘Tea Horse’ Restaurant and Bar.

The former Tea-Horse Road itself, too, is increasingly being promoted as a cultural phenomenon and tourist attraction, aimed chiefly, but not exclusively, at the rapidly-expanding Chinese tourist market. ‘Tea-Horse tours’ are offered by travel companies operating from Kunming and Lijiang, Chengdu and Ya’an, among other cities. Sections of narrow, paved Tea-Horse Road, long since abandoned, are being restored and signposted for trekking, and old bazaars that once served the Tea-Horse trade are being rebuilt and promoted as tourist attractions.

Perhaps the best example of this is Shaxi Town in Yunnan’s Jianchuan County, not far from Lijiang. In 2001 Shaxi’s Sideng Jie Bazaar was listed by the World Monuments Fund (WMF) as an endangered site (together with, for example, Phnom Bakheng Temple at Angkor in Cambodia, Jaisalmer Fort in India, and the Tomb of Emperor Minh Mang at Hue in Vietnam). Today the Sideng Street Bazaar has been fully restored (in fact, largely reconstructed) and is being vigorously promoted by the Yunnan authorities as ‘the best-preserved bazaar on the Ancient Tea-Horse Road’ in all China.


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China china CHINA Road road The THE the Rebirth Decline

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