(CN) 1,300 years of global diplomacy ends for China's giant pandas

[Guest guest]

Jon Watts in Beijing

Friday September 14, 2007

The Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/china/story/0,,2169057,00.html

 

Giant pandas at the China Panda Protection and Research Centre in Wolong, in

 

the Sichuan province. Photograph: Reuters

 

The world's cuddliest diplomats are out of a job. China will no longer

give giant pandas to foreign countries as a way of improving

international relations, the domestic media has reported. Ending an

ancient tradition, wildlife officials said the endangered animals would

only be lent for breeding and biological research.

 

But questions are likely to be raised about the financial motives behind

a decision that looks likely to boost the lucrative business of renting

out the animals to zoos for as much as $1m (£490,000) a year.

 

Panda diplomacy dates back more than a thousand years. Tang dynasty

records show that two of the bear-like beasts were presented to the

Japanese court during the reign of the empress Wu Zetian (624 to 705).

The practice reached its peak in the early 1970s, when Mao Zedong sent

the furry black-and-white ambassadors across the globe on a diplomatic

charm offensive. A breakthrough summit with Richard Nixon in 1972 was

sealed with the gift of Hsing Hsing and Ling Ling. Two years later the

British prime minister Edward Heath was rewarded for his friendship with

the present of Chia Chia and Ching-Ching to London's zoo.

 

These days the world's fastest growing major economy is more likely to

seek international influence through trade, aid and investment.

Conservationists are also concerned that pandas are too rare to be given

away as diplomatic trophies.

 

There are believed to be only 1,600 pandas in the wild, living in the

nature reserves of Sichuan, Gansu and Shaanxi provinces. But the captive

population has made a comeback in recent years, providing a ready supply

for foreign zoos. Even so, according to ChinaNews, the age of the free

panda friendship symbol is over.

 

" The Chinese government has stopped giving pandas as gifts abroad. We

will only be conducting research with foreign countries, " the website

quoted Cao Qingyuan, a state forestry administration spokesman, as saying.

 

But airlines have not seen their last panda passengers. Under an

international research and breeding programme the forestry

administration rents them out on 10-year leases. The charge to foreign

zoos depends on a number of factors, including visitor revenues. In

the US and Japan the yearly fees are about $1m. Extra payments are made

if the pandas give birth.

 

This summer the mainland presented a pair of pandas to Hong Kong to mark

the 10th anniversary of the handover from British rule. Two others have

been offered to Taiwan, but, with cross-straits relations fractious,

they have not yet left their birthplace in Wolong, Sichuan province.

 

Mr Cao said the gifts to the two Chinese islands were a special case of

" sending pandas between brothers " .

[Guest guest]

Dear John,

Thank you for posting this. Hopefully, China's ban will

stay. However, the attached news item might interest you. The late Gerald

Durrell, speaking of Giant Panda diplomacy, described it as a shameful trade

of animals reduced to being piebald prostitutes for shunting all over the

world. George Schaller's book, 'The Last Panda', devotes an entire

chapter on this scandal entitled 'Rent a Panda'. I have enclosed some

information on Giant Panda trade that might be of some use. Schaller is

unsparing in his criticism of American and European zoos that use pandas for

exhibition purposes, in what he calls the " rent-a-*panda* " program. " The

mad, greedy scramble for pandas is disillusioning, " he says. " In the end,

you must do what's best for the animal and you have to live with yourself.

There are some things you cannot compromise. "

Best wishes and kind regards,

 

 

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2007-09/12/content_6101433.htm China

selects pair of pandas to live in Australia (Xinhua)

Updated: 2007-09-12 16:24

 

BEIJING - China has selected a pair of giant pandas, Wangwang and Funi, to

live in Australia as a goodwill gesture promised during a recent visit to

Australia by President Hu Jintao.

 

The male panda Wangwang is two years old, born on August 31 in 2005, and the

female one Funi is one year old, born on August 23 in 2006, said Cao

Qingyao, spokesman for the State Forestry Administration, at a routine press

conference on Wednesday.

 

The pair currently reside in the Wolong-based China Conservation and

Research Center for the Giant Panda in Southwest China's Sichuan Province,

but will move to Adelaide Zoo, in South Australia, Cao said.

 

Cao said the China Wildlife Conservation Association, on behalf of the

ministry, has signed a ten-year agreement with Adelaide Zoo on the

protection and joint research of the giant pandas.

 

" The Australian side has started preparations for the construction of

facilities for the pandas and the pair will be transported to Australia as

soon as the facilities are ready, " said Cao.

 

Another pair of giant pandas, Bing Xing and Hua Zui Ba, set off for Madrid

on Friday to stay in Spain for ten years.

 

The giant panda is one of the world's rarest animals, with about 1,590

living in the wild in China, mostly in the southwest of the country. Another

210 have been bred in captivity.

 

China has been raising pandas through artificial insemination and breeding

for nearly 50 years. The number of newborns rose to 34 with 30 surviving

last year. Both were record figures.

http://abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/09/13/2032392.htm Giant pandas still

Adelaide bound

 

Posted Thu Sep 13, 2007 7:30pm AEST

 

- *Map: *Adelaide

5000<http://www.abc.net.au/news/maps/map.htm?lat=-34.9295 & long=138.5982 & caption=\

Adelaide

5000>

 

The Adelaide Zoo says it will still be receiving two giant pandas from China

despite the Chinese Government changing its panda policy.

 

Beijing says it will no longer be giving the endangered animals to foreign

countries as a goodwill gesture, only for breeding and biological research.

Adelaide Zoo CEO Dr Chris West says the South Australian deal is all about

breeding and research so it will go ahead as planned in 2009.

 

------------------------------

 

http://www.nytimes.com/books/98/12/06/specials/schaller-panda.html Loved To

Death *Date:* March 28, 1993, Sunday, Late Edition - Final

*Byline:* By Geoffrey C. Ward;

*Lead:*

 

THE LAST *PANDA* *By George B. Schaller. Illustrated. 291 pp. Chicago: The

University of Chicago Press. *

*Text:*

 

NOTHING the natural world does to the biologist George Schaller seems to

offend him. At one time or another during the four arduous years of

fieldwork he chronicles in his new book, " The Last *Panda*, " clouds of fleas

settled on his trousers and infested his bedding, vipers struck at his

boots, and as he sat in his lamplit tent in the evenings writing up his

notes, mobs of mice scurried across his feet.

 

Since such onslaughts proceed from instinct and evolution, not choice, Mr.

Schaller shrugs them off. The follies that make him mad are those committed

by human beings who are capable of picking one course of action over

another, who are supposedly imbued with scruples and who are purportedly

able to learn from experience. " The Last *Panda* " is really two books in

one: a group portrait of the animals he calls " the most endearing creatures

I have ever seen, " and a litany of human errors -- of crimes against nature

-- that may already have insured the *panda*'s disappearance from the wild.

 

THE power of Mr. Schaller's sinewy prose, and the relentlessly cheerful way

he and his wife, Kay, pursue their famously shy quarry up and down the

slopes of the mist-shrouded ridges to which it clings, will come as no

surprise to those who have read his earlier books, " The Serengeti Lion, "

" The Mountain Gorilla " and " The Giant Pandas of Wolong. " No scientist is

better at letting the rest of us in on just how the natural world works; no

poet sees that world with greater clarity or writes about it with more

grace.

 

Here, for example, is the first glimpse he offers of the *panda*'s solitary

life:

 

" In the stillness, leaves suddenly rustled and a stem cracked like breaking

glass. Shrouded in bamboo was a giant *panda*, a female, slumped softly in

the snow, her back propped against a shrub. Leaning to one side, she reached

out and hooked a bamboo stem with the ivory claws of a forepaw, bent in the

stem, and with a fluid movement bit it off near the base. Stem firmly

grasped, she sniffed it to verify that it was indeed palatable, and then ate

it, end first, like a stalk of celery. While her powerful molars sectioned

and crushed the stem, she glanced around for another, her movements placid

and skillful, a perfect ecological integration between *panda* and bamboo.

She ate within a circle of three feet, moved a few steps and ate some more,

consuming only coarse stems and discarding the leafy tops; she then sat

hunched, forepaws in her lap, drowsy and content. Within a circle of 3,000

feet was her universe, all that she needed: bamboo, a mate, a snug tree-den

in which to bear young. "

 

In 1980, Mr. Schaller, jointly sponsored by the Chinese Government and the

World Wildlife Fund, became the first outsider ever permitted by the Chinese

to study the *panda* in the wild, and " The Last *Panda* " is filled with

vivid findings about everything from *panda* vocalizing ( " a medley of moans,

hoots, yips and growly barks " ) to the formidable barriers to mating (for a

successful union, both male and female must be in season, a synchronization

of ardor that for some reason rarely occurs in zoos).

 

But the most important discoveries made by Mr. Schaller and his Chinese

colleagues concern the adaptations forced on the animal by its highly

specialized diet. The *panda*, Mr. Schaller explains, is " a bear-like animal

devoted wholly to recycling bamboo, a creature as improbable as a

carnivorous cow. " Pandas have the simple innards of carnivores yet survive

almost exclusively on bamboo. Why they generally ignore other nutritious

plants growing right alongside their diet staple is just one of many

mysteries awaiting further research.

 

It is a woefully inefficient arrangement in any case: the *panda*'s

digestive system can only assimilate about 17 percent of the bamboo it

consumes and so the animal must locate and eat prodigious amounts every day:

one *panda* Mr. Schaller studied consumed 85 pounds of bamboo in 24 hours,

half her body weight. A *panda* stubbornly relying on bamboo, he writes, is

" somewhat like a person who subsists only on watermelon. "

 

The severely limited energy their diet affords must be carefully husbanded:

male pandas shrink from confrontation rather than risk the fatigue that

might be induced by fighting for their territory; pandas avoid tree-climbing

or sudden movements whenever possible, and they resist the impulse to hunt

smaller animals, perhaps for fear that the energy they expend in chasing

them down will prove greater than the energy to be gained from chewing them

up.

 

EVEN the comic face that helps make the *panda* such a crowd pleaser, Mr.

Schaller believes, is linked to the animal's need to conserve energy through

forestalling conflict. " In pandas, as in many animals, a stare represents a

threat, " he writes. " The eye patches enlarge the *panda*'s small, dark eyes

tenfold, making the stare more potent. In addition, a staring *panda* often

holds its neck low, a position that not only presents the eye patches to an

opponent but also outlines the black ears against the white neck, in effect

presenting two pairs of threatening eyes. "

 

Mr. Schaller found his *panda* research the most difficult of his career not

because of the work itself but because of the conditions under which it had

to be performed. The World Wildlife Fund and the Chinese Government in

Beijing frequently clashed over funding, threatening to scuttle the project.

The memory of the Cultural Revolution was still fresh in Chinese minds, and

foreigners thus remained suspect: when Mr. Schaller tried to send bamboo

abroad for the sort of chemical analysis that could not be performed in

China, permission was refused. Many of the Chinese assigned to assist him

saw their presence in remote mountain forests as evidence only of their lack

of political clout within the Communist Party and so did as little work as

they could get away with. And fresh scientific findings were simply ignored

if they challenged conventional wisdom.

 

Mr. Schaller showed, for example, that the periodic die-off of one variety

of bamboo was not fatal to pandas as long as other varieties still

flourished, but when such a die-off occurred in 1983 the Chinese Government

used it as the pretext for a massive trapping program. Over the next four

years, 108 animals -- close to 10 percent of the wild pandas in China --

were " rescued. " Thirty-three died in captivity. Thirty-five were relocated

to a different forest. The rest were locked up in zoos or provincial holding

stations. " Hunched in corners of their iron-barred cages, " Mr. Schaller

writes, " most would pass their years viewed by an enthusiastic public that

sees only a clownish face, not the haunting image of a dying species. "

 

MR. SCHALLER does pay tribute where tribute is due. Despite daunting

problems, the Chinese have made a serious commitment to preserving what

little is left of their wildlife. There are already 600 nature reserves in

China and plans call for a total of nearly 800, comprising about 5 percent

of the country's territory. But, as a Chinese proverb has it, " distant water

cannot put out a nearby fire " ; policies promulgated in Beijing have less and

less impact the farther they travel into the countryside. People who are

accustomed to living in the forest, far from Beijing, and who were never

consulted when the reserve boundaries were drawn, resist orders to move and

continue to fell trees and trap animals just as they always have. Funds

desperately needed to defend the *panda*'s habitat are diverted to

brick-and-mortar projects -- laboratories, research centers, holding

stations for captive pandas -- that look better on the books. A complacent

bureaucracy punishes initiative among junior officers; one especially

dynamic forester with whom Mr. Schaller worked ended up running a gold mine

far from the pandas that had been his passion.

 

Mr. Schaller's willingness to point out the failings of the Chinese

Government is rare and refreshing, but anyone who is concerned with wildlife

management in other emerging countries knows that these shortcomings are not

exclusively Chinese. And indeed there are few biologists in *any *country

who can rival Mr. Schaller's commitment to wildlife or his exultation in

hard work.

 

Still, the Chinese do add their own distinctive spin. Among the Chinese, Mr.

Schaller writes, he " found little empathy for animals in China. " He finds it

noteworthy " that the Chinese written character for 'animal' means 'moving

thing.' " Too often, Chinese wildlife is seen simply as a source of revenue.

A state-owned outfit called the China National Native Produce and Animal

Byproducts Import and Export Corporation sends its agents into the

countryside to exhort local people to trap and shoot and net whatever they

can for sale abroad.

 

And when wildlife gets thin on the ground, the Chinese are uniquely

enterprising in coming up with ways to make the animals' remnants continue

to produce a profit. For example, in Asia tiger parts -- bones, eyes,

whiskers, penises -- are widely believed to have medicinal powers, and so

the Chinese, having slaughtered almost all their free-living tigers, have

established a breeding farm to raise carnivores whose sole *raison d'etre *is

to be disassembled, ground up and sold to clients at home and abroad.

Recently, according to Mr. Schaller, China demanded from the Convention on

International Trade in Endangered Species a permit to peddle its tiger

products overseas: " If we don't get the permit, " one official told a visitor

to the breeding farm, " we'll just kill all the tigers. "

 

So far, pandas have been worth more to the Chinese alive than dead. In 1987

the Chinese began renting them for six-figure sums, plus a cut of souvenir

sales. In an astonishingly shortsighted display of greed, zoo directors all

around the world struggled to outbid one another for pandas, heedless of the

damage they might do to the species. Presidents and prime ministers got

involved, too. International agreements banning trade in endangered animals

capable of breeding were blandly overlooked. " With *panda* numbers dwindling

year by year, not every zoo, not every country can have them, " Mr. Schaller

warns. " The *panda* has not evolved to amuse humankind. "

 

Perhaps as few as 1,000 pandas now survive in the wild, divided into 24

separate and isolated populations, some with fewer than 20 animals, all of

them vulnerable to poachers and, should they somehow outlive that danger,

ultimately subject to the reproductive fall-off that inevitably results from

too small a gene pool.

 

In 1989, the World Wildlife Fund drew up a comprehensive conservation plan

that if put into practice, Mr. Schaller believes, would at least slow the *

panda*'s decline; but Beijing has only recently signed a watered-down

version of the plan and has not yet begun to implement it.

 

The Chinese Government won't like this book. But anyone who genuinely cares

for wildlife cannot help being grateful to Mr. Schaller -- both for his

efforts to understand the *panda* and for the candor with which he reports

what has gone so badly wrong in the struggle to save it from extinction. A

BEAUTIFUL OBITUARY WON'T HELP

 

" If you take the *panda* as a metaphor for the exponential destruction of

the environment all over the world, then things are improving a little bit, "

said the biologist and author George B. Schaller. " The Chinese Government is

now more seriously concerned with breeding because it's finally sinking in

that they are losing the animal. "

 

In a career that has spanned more than 30 years, Mr. Schaller has faced down

big cats and mountain gorillas. In his newest book, he displays a certain

degree of courage in exposing the self-interest of governments and

institutions. " The Last *Panda*, " he said, is a work " reluctantly written. "

It deals not only with the special, almost mystical animals themselves but

with the imperatives of conservation and the crass world of " *panda*politics. "

 

In a telephone interview from his Connecticut home, just hours before

departing for a research station in Zaire, Mr. Schaller mused on the book.

" I always wonder how much information I should put in, " he said. " I like

working in China so I don't want to be critical, but my main concern is the

*panda*. For conservation you must have public support, and you cannot,

unless the public has information as to what is really going on.

 

" I was trained as a biologist, " he continued. " Research is fun and it's

easy. But no scientist now can afford just to study. There's a moral

obligation to do more for conservation. If you only study, you might get to

write a beautiful obituary but you're not helping to perpetuate the

species. "

 

Mr. Schaller is unsparing in his criticism of American and European zoos

that use pandas for exhibition purposes, in what he calls the " rent-a-*panda

* " program. " The mad, greedy scramble for pandas is disillusioning, " he

said. " In the end, you must do what's best for the animal and you have to

live with yourself. There are some things you cannot compromise. " -- LYNN

KARPEN

 

 

http://american.edu/ted/PANDA.HTM

Panda Trade

 

About Ted Categories All Ted Case

 

CASE NUMBER: 56

CASE MNEMONIC: PANDA

CASE NAME: Panda Trade

 

A. IDENTIFICATION

 

1. The Issue

 

The decline of the panda is related to the loss of its bamboo

habitat as well as poaching. Poaching satisfies both domestic and

foreign demand, where panda parts are used for medicines,

ornaments, crafts, or other purposes. Pandas are at the top of the

list of " mega-charistmatic " animals, and the panda has become a

symbol of threatened wildlife around the world. Because of their

popularity, pandas are the most often visited of all animals in

zoos and places such as the Washington National Zoo are noted for

their panda exhibit. Because of their importance as a tourist

attraction, trade in pandas has become an expensive and yet

somewhat uncontrolled industry. Some accuse the zoos of

contributing to the decline of the panda by acquiring them

essentially for financial reasons.

 

2. Description

 

The panda has thrived in China for more than 3 million years.

However, in the last four decades China's population has more than

doubled to nearly 1.2 billion and the once remote habitat of the

panda is now being seriously encroached by human beings. Their

habitat is being destroyed by peasants and loggers, who cut trees

which leaves the bamboo, which needs shade and moisture, exposed to

the sun. This eventually kills the bamboo. In the 1970's, China

admitted what conservationists had been telling it for years.

China's national symbol, the Giant Panda, was in danger of facing

extinction.

 

No animal is more prized than China's giant panda, now in

grave danger of extinction. The demand for the popular creature by

zoos all over the world, commonly known as " panda loans " , is said

to contribute to the animal's demise. China's black market trade

in endangered species including pandas also adds to the slide

towards extinction.

 

Pandas are notoriously hard to breed and therefore the only

supply of pandas comes from their shrinking habitat in China.

Cooperation among the Chinese government, zoos world-wide, and the

various private groups, such as World Wildlife Fund, is underway to

save the clown-faced Chinese bears. At most 1,000 giant pandas

survive in the wild. A small cluster of pandas is confined in

Sichuan, Shaanxi, and Gansu provinces in China. An additional 100

pandas are confined in cages and posing for cameras in world zoos.

 

Panda's have a highly specialized diet and survive almost

exclusively on bamboo. The panda's digestive system can only

assimilate about 17 percent of the bamboo it consumes -- thus the

animal must locate and eat prodigious amounts every day. In one

study, a panda consumed 85 pounds of bamboo in 24 hours, half its

body weight. The animal's reluctance to assimilate additional

nutritional plants alongside their diet staple is another issue

that makes life in a zoo difficult for pandas. The panda's diet

severely limits their energy level. Male pandas shrink away from

confrontation rather than risk the fatigue that might be induced

from fighting for their territory. Panda's avoid activities such

as tree climbing or sudden movements whenever possible; and resist

the impulse to hunt smaller animals, perhaps for fear that the

energy they expend in chasing them down will prove greater than the

energy to be gained from eating them.

 

George Schaller, biologist and the first outsider ever

permitted by the Chinese to study the panda in the wild, notes that

the comic face that makes the panda such a crowd pleaser is linked

to the animals need to conserve energy through forestalling

conflict. Western zoo's desires for panda loans are actually

contributing to the demise of the panda. " Rent-a-panda " deals and

short term loans of giant pandas to western zoos, usually entails

large investments for both the zoos and the Chinese government,

which receives up to a half a million per panda. The zoo's

justification is that the exhibits, which draw people in droves,

can raise awareness about the precarious plight of the panda as

well as provide funds for China's conservation efforts. Critics

charge that the " rent-a-panda " programs disrupts the breeding's

cycle pattern. Therefore some loans are restricted to non-breeding

pandas over the age of 15. Because of the animal's enormous

popular appeal and the amount of money involved, the politics of

panda conservation are vicious, according to Devra Kleinman,

assistant director of research at Washington's National Zoo.

 

3. Related Cases

USCHINA <http://american.edu/ted/uschina.htm> caseRHINO

<http://american.edu/ted/rhino.htm> caseTIGER

<http://american.edu/ted/tiger.htm> caseBEAR

<http://american.edu/ted/bear.htm> caseELEPHANT

<http://american.edu/ted/elephant.htm> caseBEAR

<http://american.edu/ted/bear.htm> case

 

Keyword Clusters

 

(1): Domain = ASIA

(2): Bio-geography = TEMPerate

(3): Environmental Problem = Special Loss Land [sPLL]

 

4. Draft Author: Ruby Lau

 

B. LEGAL Clusters

 

5. Discourse and Status: DISagreement and INPROGress

 

The Chinese Forestry Department acknowledges that it is a

common responsibility for the whole of mankind to protect

endangered wildlife species. China has set up 451 nature reserves

for wildlife covering more than 46 million hectares. The

government plans to increase the number of reserves to about 500,

which will account for 5 percent of the country's total land area,

or 50 million hectares. Recent Chinese measures against illegal

hunting and trading of endangered animals have also been harsh (see

ELEPHANT, RHINO, TIGER, and USCHINA cases). Statistics indicate

that of those convicted of hunting, trading, or killing the giant

panda, four have been sentenced to death, several dozens have

received life imprisonment penalties, and hundreds have been

jailed. China has invested heavily in creating protection projects

for endangered animals and has established 14 treatment and

breeding centers for endangered animals, including pandas. In 1983

during the bamboo crisis, China saved 110 sick and 146 hungry giant

pandas.

 

Environmentalism is a new and alien concept to China. Chinese

society tends to emphasize the utility of animals parts. Exotic

pets are status symbols, and the skins of exotic animals hang in

homes of the wealthy. Although China called for tougher

application of its laws against animal trafficking, it is doubtful

the it has the resources or the political will to mount a sustained

enforcement effort. The willingness of many police officers to

accept small bribes makes a mockery of legislation. China has made

some progress in the protection of the wildlife since 1980. China

joined the World Wildlife Fund for Nature, International Union for

Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources and the Convention on

International Trade in Endangered Species of wild flora and fauna

(CITES). Three years later, laws and regulations aimed at

protecting the land and animals were published.

 

6. Forum and Scope: CITES and MULTIlateral

 

Criticism is inherent in the dispute about the adequacy of

China's conservation efforts. Although the Chinese have made major

strides, they are pursuing conservation with less vigor than their

Western colleagues would like. Complicating matters, the oversight

for the panda is divided into two ministries -- the forestry

ministry, which runs the 12 panda reserves and the urban and

environment ministry, which runs the zoos. Communication between

the two ministries is poor which makes a unified effort difficult.

 

7. Decision Breadth: 117 (CITES signatories)

 

8. Legal Standing: TREATY

 

To prevent zoos from importing pandas for a commercial gain,

there have been quotas imposed on the trade of pandas. The Clinton

administration is reassessing its policy towards U.S. zoos

exhibiting giant pandas and will temporary ban their importation

from China. The Fish and Wildlife Service wants to evaluate

whether U.S. actions are helping to ensure the panda's survival in

the wild. The United States has expressed interest in long-term

captive breeding programs which would bring larger numbers of the

endangered species here. U.S officials have voiced their concerns

about the Chinese commitment to panda conservation as the animal's

habitat suffers increasing encroachment. However, Ling-Ling, the

National Zoo's former female panda gave birth to six cubs, none of

which survived.

 

C. GEOGRAPHIC Clusters

 

9. Geographic Locations

 

a. Geographic Domain : ASIA

b. Geographic Site : East Asia [EASIA]

c. Geographic Impact : USA

 

10. Sub-National Factors: NO

 

11. Type of Habitat: TEMPerate

 

The area is actually a unique forest that includes bamboo

necessary for the panda's diet.

 

D. TRADE Clusters

 

12. Type of Measure: Import Ban [iMBAN]

 

At the present, there are licensing requirements and a ban on

imports. Panda loans, if properly regulated, can be of tremendous

benefit to conservation; however, bribes and illegal trade often

override regulations.

 

13. Direct vs. Indirect Impacts: DIRect

 

14. Relation of Measure to Environmental Impact

 

a. Directly Related : YES PANDA

b. Indirectly Related : NO

c. Not Related : NO

d. Process Related : YES Species Loss Land [sPLL]

 

15. Trade Product Identification: PANDA

 

16. Economic Data

 

The panda trade is a big business. Zoo directors worldwide

struggle to outbid one another for pandas. Fortunately, this has

one beneficial impact: pandas are worth more to the Chinese alive

than dead. In 1987, the Chinese began renting them for six-figure

sums, plus a cut of souvenir sales from zoos.

 

17. Impact of Measure on Trade Competitiveness: BAN

 

Conservationist organizations are becoming stricter in their

efforts of panda conservation. The Fish and Wildlife Service have

recently turned down the San Diego's zoo request for a pair of

giant pandas. Zoo officials who already spent $1 million to build

an exhibit area and a gift shop are appealing the agency's

decision.

 

18. Industry Sector: ENTERtainment

 

The popularity of the panda is also an attractive source of

revenue for zoos. Therefore, the case probably belongs to the

entertainment industry.

 

19. Exporter and Importer: CHINA and USA

 

Little aggregate data on panda trade exist. Panda pelts sell

for $10,000 on the black market in Hong Kong and dealers and

collectors in Japan, Hong Kong, and Taiwan pay $40,000 for panda

skins. On the other hand, a Japanese zoo paid $10 million for 10-

year loan of a panda. Leading world importers are Hong Kong,

Japan, Taiwan, and the United States.

 

E. ENVIRONMENT Clusters

 

20. Environmental Problem Type: Species Loss Land [sPLL]

 

In addition to the giant panda, China is home to the golden

monkey, the south chinese tiger, the chinese alligator, the chinese

sturgeon, and the yangtze dolphin. These creatures are threatened

as their natural habitats are also shrinking. Archaeologists have

found that in ancient times, the giant panda had a vast living

area, stretching from Beijing in the north to Guangdong and Fujian

provinces in the South. After the Ming Dynasty, the panda's domain

gradually shrank to the bamboo forests in the Sichuan provinces.

 

21. Name, Type, and Diversity of Species

 

Name: Panda

Type: Animal/Vertibrate/Mammal/Carnivore

Diversity: 41 Mammals per 10,000 km/sq (China)

 

22. Resource Impact and Effect: HIGH and PRODuct

 

Policies and laws along with conservation efforts will

determine the fate of the pandas. Elaborate research and breading

facilities are significant measures that could assist survival.

 

23. Urgency and Lifetime: HIGH and about 20 years

 

Serious efforts are being made to preserve this well admired

species. Elaborate research and captive breeding programs are some

of the contributing efforts. It has been predicted that by the

year 2025, the estimated population of the species may increase to

5,000.

 

24. Substitutes: Eco-Tourism [ECOTR]

 

VI. OTHER Factors

 

25. Culture: YES

 

The panda is an old symbol of eastern society and a newer one

of western society. Tigers adorn the national flags of many

countries and are revered in others in art and culture.

 

26. Trans-Border: NO

 

27. Rights: NO

 

28. Relevant Literature

 

Begley, Sharon. " Killed by Kindness. " Newsweek (April 12,

1993): 50.

Earle, Sue. " Panda Politics - In Black and White; Greed Wrecks

China's Conservation Efforts. " South Morning China Post

(April 25, 1993).

Roberts, Leslie. " Conservationists in Panda-monium; Dispute over

Zoos Borrowing Pandas from China. " Science (July 29,

1988): 529.

Sachs, Andrea. " " A Grisley and Illicit Trade. " Time (April 8,

1991): 67.

Schaller, George. The Last Panda. Chicago: University of

Chicago Press, 1993.

Sun, Lena. " The Politics of Being a Panda. " The Washington Post

(December 27, 1993).

Ward, Geoffrey. " Loved to Death. " The New York Times (March 28,

1993): G1.

" Zoo to the World. " The New York Times (July 19, 1981): F23.

 

 

 

 

On 9/15/07, Dr John Wedderburn <john wrote:

>

> Jon Watts in Beijing

> Friday September 14, 2007

> The Guardian

> http://www.guardian.co.uk/china/story/0,,2169057,00.html

>

> Giant pandas at the China Panda Protection and Research Centre in Wolong,

> in

>

> the Sichuan province. Photograph: Reuters

>

> The world's cuddliest diplomats are out of a job. China will no longer

> give giant pandas to foreign countries as a way of improving

> international relations, the domestic media has reported. Ending an

> ancient tradition, wildlife officials said the endangered animals would

> only be lent for breeding and biological research.

>

> But questions are likely to be raised about the financial motives behind

> a decision that looks likely to boost the lucrative business of renting

> out the animals to zoos for as much as $1m (£490,000) a year.

>

> Panda diplomacy dates back more than a thousand years. Tang dynasty

> records show that two of the bear-like beasts were presented to the

> Japanese court during the reign of the empress Wu Zetian (624 to 705).

> The practice reached its peak in the early 1970s, when Mao Zedong sent

> the furry black-and-white ambassadors across the globe on a diplomatic

> charm offensive. A breakthrough summit with Richard Nixon in 1972 was

> sealed with the gift of Hsing Hsing and Ling Ling. Two years later the

> British prime minister Edward Heath was rewarded for his friendship with

> the present of Chia Chia and Ching-Ching to London's zoo.

>

> These days the world's fastest growing major economy is more likely to

> seek international influence through trade, aid and investment.

> Conservationists are also concerned that pandas are too rare to be given

> away as diplomatic trophies.

>

> There are believed to be only 1,600 pandas in the wild, living in the

> nature reserves of Sichuan, Gansu and Shaanxi provinces. But the captive

> population has made a comeback in recent years, providing a ready supply

> for foreign zoos. Even so, according to ChinaNews, the age of the free

> panda friendship symbol is over.

>

> " The Chinese government has stopped giving pandas as gifts abroad. We

> will only be conducting research with foreign countries, " the website

> quoted Cao Qingyuan, a state forestry administration spokesman, as saying.

>

>

> But airlines have not seen their last panda passengers. Under an

> international research and breeding programme the forestry

> administration rents them out on 10-year leases. The charge to foreign

> zoos depends on a number of factors, including visitor revenues. In

> the US and Japan the yearly fees are about $1m. Extra payments are made

> if the pandas give birth.

>

> This summer the mainland presented a pair of pandas to Hong Kong to mark

> the 10th anniversary of the handover from British rule. Two others have

> been offered to Taiwan, but, with cross-straits relations fractious,

> they have not yet left their birthplace in Wolong, Sichuan province.

>

> Mr Cao said the gifts to the two Chinese islands were a special case of

> " sending pandas between brothers " .

>

>

>