Shanxi seeks to revive Great Tea Road

Mayors of more than 100 cities in China, Russia and Mongolia will gather in Pingyao, Shanxi province from Oct 17 to 18 to discuss plans to revive one of the greatest land trade routes of the pre-industrial age, the Great Tea Road.

A series of seminars and roundtables are scheduled for the summit, with the aim of striking a deal to boost trade and tourism along the route, which once stretched from South China across Mongolia and Siberia all the way to Moscow.

The trade route, often referred to as the "ten-thousand-mile tea road" in Chinese, first rose to prominence in the 17th century as Europeans began to develop a taste for Chinese tea.

Merchants would haul crates of their clients' favorite strains more than 13,000 kilometers on horseback across some of the world's most rugged terrain to reach Russia's capital.

Pingyao acted as a key financial and trade hub along the route, where China's first bank was established to facilitate deals between merchants and local dealers who gathered in the city to sell tea grown near Wuyi Mountain in Southeast China.

The county is hoping that it will resume its former role in the 21st century in the wake of the summit.