Jiāonán lǜchá (胶南绿茶) is a green tea of the former county-level city of Jiaonan (胶南市) in the south of Qingdao, Shandong Province. Tea here is young: it was brought from the south in the mid-1960s under the provincial program “南茶北引” — “bring southern tea to the north”, and the first local green tea was made in 1969. The protection zone runs along three mountain ridges, and the requirements describe the appearance of the tea through a comparison with southern teas: the leaf is larger and heavier, the liquor brighter, the aroma chestnut. The name is protected twice: as an agricultural product geographical indication and under announcement No. 646 (2025) of the China National Intellectual Property Administration.
1. Classification and Origin
- Type: Green tea (绿茶, lǜchá), unfermented; the class is stated in the name.
- Category: Northern green tea of Shandong; geographical indication product.
- Origin: China, Shandong Province (山东, Shāndōng), the city of Qingdao (青岛, Qīngdǎo), the territory of the former county-level city of Jiaonan (胶南, Jiāonán). The county was abolished, and its lands became part of Huangdao District (黄岛区), where the 2025 applicant comes from; the indication has kept the old name.
- Protection zone: The towns of Haiqing (海青), Dachang (大场), Zhangjialou (张家楼), Cangnan (藏南), Dacun (大村), Liuwang (六汪), Baoshan (宝山), Liwuguan (理务关), Wangtai (王台) and the subdistricts of Tieshan (铁山), Yinzhu (隐珠) and Lingshanwei (灵山卫) — in the belt of the Zhushan (珠山), Tieshan and Cangmashan (藏马山) ridges. The total in the document is 14 towns and subdistricts, 163 villages, although twelve are named individually; the discrepancy is in the text itself.
- Geographic coordinates: 119°30′–120°11′ E, 35°35′–36°08′ N.
2. History and Cultural Significance
- History: The main account of how local tea began is an essay by a local writer in the newspaper Qingdao Xihai’an Bao (2025), written for the sixtieth anniversary of “南茶北引” in Haiqing. According to it:
- 1957. The provincial committee entrusted “南茶北引” to the trade department. The trials failed for years; only a plot in Qingdao’s Zhongshan Park survived.
- Winter 1965. The first trial plantings in the county: 3 mu in Zhangcang village (张仓村) and 2.6 mu in Gaoyu village (高峪村).
- 1966. The plantings were expanded in Haiqing commune — 42 mu in three villages, the main one being Houhexi (后河西). In winter many bushes were killed by frost. Protection was found in dense planting with a low crown, autumn pruning, watering and fertilizing before winter, windbreak screens and grass mulch; among the varieties, the more frost-resistant seeds from Anhui were chosen.
- 1968. Five villages of Haiqing built a joint tea factory in Houhexi.
- 1969. The first batch of their own green tea. According to the essay, experts of the Tea Research Institute of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences noted the clean aroma, the rich taste and the ability to withstand repeated infusions, and judged the quality higher than that of southern tea.
- 1970–1972. In 1970 photographs of the Haiqing garden and tea samples were shown in Beijing; by the end of 1972, 16 communes and 74 villages of the county were growing tea, 1400 mu of gardens, the most in Haiqing.
- 1980s — 1990s. After the transition to the household contract system (1982) and the end of state procurement, the gardens shrank sharply; from the early 1990s, when the province supported the industry, it recovered.
- Protection. The name is entered in the register of agricultural product geographical indications under number AGI00278; the year of registration is not named in the sources consulted. By announcement No. 646 of 23 September 2025, the China National Intellectual Property Administration recognized Jiāonán lǜchá as a geographical indication product.
- Name: “Jiaonan” (胶南) is the name of the abolished county-level city; “lǜchá” (绿茶) means “green tea”.
- Cultural significance: For the district this tea is a memory of “南茶北引”; the essay calls the tea one of the pillars of the local rural economy, and the 1966 garden near Houhe village (后河村) one of the oldest surviving contiguous tea gardens in Shandong.
3. Botanical Description and Raw Material
- Variety / Cultivar: The protection requirements prescribe “local fine varieties bred and acclimatized here” (当地选育驯化的优良品种), but do not name them. The requirements for the neighboring name Haiqing Cha list the local varieties 胶南春, 海青锋, 海北春 and 海青翡翠.
- Harvest: From late April or early May; between the solar terms Bailu (白露) and Qiufen (秋分), that is, in September, picking is stopped and the garden is “closed”.
- Harvest standard: The requirements say what to leave on the bush: in spring at first the 钱叶 leaf, later one leaf, in summer and autumn the “fish” leaf (鱼叶); paired leaves without a bud (对夹叶) are picked off completely. Picking is frequent, in batches.
4. Terroir and Cultivation Features
- Region: The coastal mountains of southern Qingdao; the gardens run along the Zhushan, Tieshan and Cangmashan ridges.
- Site: Sunny half-slopes and hills sheltered from the wind, with a gradient of no more than 25°, with a water source; groundwater deeper than 100 cm.
- Soils: Fertile acidic or slightly acidic sandy loam, pH 4.5–6.5; thickness 80–100 cm or more, the living layer no less than 40 cm.
- Altitude and climate: No numerical data in the sources consulted.
- Planting: The ground is dug deeper than 80 cm. Seedlings from cuttings are planted in spring in double rows in sunken beds (凹田双行密植): row spacings of 120 and 30 cm, 20–30 cm between holes — about 6000 plants per mu.
- Care: The main fertilizer is organic; phosphorus-potassium fertilizers — 30–50 kg per mu. Pruning is done between the solar terms Chunfen and Qingming: autumn shoots and part of the summer shoots are cut back by 3–5 cm.
5. Production Technology
The protection requirements do not describe a single processing step. The usual sequence for green tea:
- Spreading the leaf (摊放, tānfàng): The leaf gives off part of its moisture.
- Fixation (杀青, shāqīng): Heat stops oxidation.
- Rolling (揉捻, róuniǎn).
- Drying (干燥, gānzào).
This is the general scheme of the class, not a description of the technology of Jiāonán lǜchá.
6. Organoleptic Characteristics
The description is given according to the 2025 protection requirements; the wordings of the source are in parentheses.
- Dry leaf appearance: Buds and leaves large, the blade thick (芽叶肥壮，叶片厚); in shape the tea is larger and heavier than southern teas (外形较南茶硕壮重实); the color ink-green, oily and glossy (墨绿油润).
- Dry leaf aroma: No separate description in the sources consulted.
- Liquor aroma: Chestnut, rich, high and long (栗香浓郁高长). The requirements do not separate the aroma of the leaf from that of the liquor.
- Taste: Fresh, soft, brisk (鲜醇爽口).
- Liquor color: Yellow-green, brighter than that of southern teas (黄绿较南茶明亮).
- Spent leaves (wet leaves): Yellow-green, even, bright (黄绿匀亮).
7. Chemical Composition
The protection requirements give two blocks of figures.
| Indicator | Requirement |
|---|---|
| Moisture | no more than 6.0% |
| Fines | no more than 4.0% |
| Total ash | no more than 6.0% |
| Extractives | no less than 37.0% |
| Crude fiber | no more than 16.0% |
| Selenium | no less than 25 mg/kg |
| Free amino acids | no less than 3.0% |
The second block is called “special components”: polyphenols 13.2–26.8%, catechins 6.2–13.4%, amino acids 2–4.8%, caffeine 1325–1902 mg/kg, flavonoids 7.3–11.8%, extractives 42.6–53.5%, soluble sugars 0.72–1.28%.
These figures call for caution, and the reasons are visible in the document itself:
- Caffeine of 1325–1902 mg/kg is 0.13–0.19%, whereas in the requirements for other teas in the same announcement caffeine is expressed in percent. I do not rule out a unit error.
- The amino acid threshold (no less than 3.0%) and the range in the “special components” (from 2%) contradict each other.
- The selenium threshold of 25 mg/kg is very high: for comparison, for Enshi Xicha, a tea with selenium in its very name, the average content is given as about 0.21 mg/kg.
- The whole block of “special components” is repeated word for word in the requirements for another product in the same announcement — 崇庆枇杷茶 from Sichuan.
8. Brewing
Class practice for green tea.
- Water temperature: 80–85 °C.
- Tea amount: 3 g per 150 ml.
- Teaware: A gaiwan or a glass tumbler.
- Process: Warm the teaware, pour the water down the side, first infusion — 40–60 seconds, then two or three more infusions, leaving part of the liquor.
9. Storage
Class practice. In airtight packaging, in a refrigerator at 0–5 °C, away from light, moisture and odors; best drunk within a year.
10. Price and Counterfeits
Price data are not found in the sources consulted.
- How to avoid counterfeits:
- Look for the special geographical indication mark and a producer from Huangdao District, from the territory of the former Jiaonan.
- Do not confuse it with Haiqing Cha (海青茶): this is a separate name in the same announcement with a smaller zone — 43 villages of Haiqing Town inside the zone of Jiāonán lǜchá.
11. Interesting Facts
- The protection zone is tied to three mountain ridges, not only to the boundaries of towns.
- The first batch of local tea was made in 1969 — three years after the mass plantings.
- The name of an abolished county-level city lives on in the geographical indication, and inside its zone lies another one — Haiqing Cha.
12. Comparison with Other Teas of Shandong
- Laoshan Lü Cha (崂山绿茶): A green tea of Laoshan District of the same Qingdao, from Mount Laoshan.
- Rizhao Lü Cha (日照绿茶): A green tea of Rizhao prefecture-level city, which also grew out of “南茶北引”.
- Haiqing Cha (海青茶): The name tied to Haiqing Town, with similar wording on the appearance.
In Conclusion:
Jiāonán lǜchá is a northern green tea that is six decades old: the southern bushes took root here after winters of losses and the selection of frost-resistant seeds. The requirements describe it without technology, but with a comparison with the south: the leaf is larger and heavier, the liquor brighter, the aroma chestnut. The chemical composition figures in the document call for caution, and the zone along three ridges keeps the name of a county that no longer exists.
Sources
Geographical indication
Full list — on the Sources page