Pu'er's regional specialties go global

The China-EU Agreement on Geographical Indications (GIs) came into effect on March 1, in which tea and coffee from Pu'er city, southwest Yunnan province, were included in the scope of protection of the agreement.

This is the first ever comprehensive and high-level GIs agreement signed between China and foreign body, and the appendix of the agreement includes over 500 products from both sides.

Pu’er, known as the “tea garden of the world”, has some of the most ancient tea trees across the globe with nearly 2,000 years old. The total area of wild tea trees there exceeds 180,000 mu (approximately 12,000 hectares).

A name of the “Tea Source of the World” thus has been given to Pu’er by the International Tea Committee (ITC).

Dubbed the “coffee capital of China”, Pu’er is also a major producing and distributing center of coffee in China which has been providing quality coffee products to both domestic and international markets for years.

Nestlé's Nescafé Coffee Center (NCC), the Yunnan International Coffee Exchange Center, as well as a key national coffee laboratory have all been settled in Pu’er.

Today, coffee from Pu’er, as a representative of Chinese coffee, has been recognized by the International Coffee Organization (ICO) as first-class products.

It is believed that the agreement will further enhance the cooperation between China and the EU, and help bring quality tea and coffee from Pu’er to the world.

Reporting by Dai Zheng (Xinhua); trans-editing by Zhang Shuyu