It is hard to take your eyes off China’s national icon as it happily munches on a bamboo shoot, apparently oblivious to the shrieks of delight from a party of schoolchildren. Unfortunately, this is not that rare moment of spotting an endangered species in the wild, but one shared with the 600 or so visitors who come each day to the panda breeding centre in Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan province.
Nothing quite prepares you for the thrill of seeing a giant panda — so distinct in their black and white fur, so intriguing in their slow, bearish movements.
It is hard to take your eyes off China’s national icon as it happily munches on a bamboo shoot, apparently oblivious to the shrieks of delight from a party of schoolchildren. Unfortunately, this is not that rare moment of spotting an endangered species in the wild, but one shared with the 600 or so visitors who come each day to the panda breeding centre in Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan province.
The Giant panda (Ailuropoda melanoleuca) was once widespread throughout southern and eastern China, as well as in neighbouring Myanmar and northern Vietnam. Due to expanding human populations and development, however, the species is now restricted to only 20 or so isolated patches of forest throughout several of China's mountain ranges.
“The greatest threat to the giant panda population is that the area in which they live is becoming smaller and more fragmented,” said Yan Yang, species programme coordinator at WWF, the global conservation organization.
“This is because of human activities such as logging, expansion of farming into forest areas, mining, and road-building.”
!ADVERTISEMENT!
It is a dangerous world out there, especially in the mountains of south-west China where pandas vie for territory with people, particularly hunters and loggers, as well as with dam construction and mass tourism. They have also been victim to China’s tumultuous history.
Despite Chairman Mao Zedang’s disastrous “Great Lead Forward” programme in the early 1960s to help jump-start the Chinese economy through the creation of large agro-industrial communes, inefficient and poor planning lead to starvation and the deaths of millions. Many desperate for food turned to hunting, even the hunting of pandas, to survive. Though panda hunting was eventually banned in 1963, illegal poaching of other animals continues to this day. In recent years, several pandas, however, have been caught in traps meant for other targets, and some panda pelts have been confiscated by the authorities.
Fragmentation of their habitat from intensive road, dam, and urban construction has also led to a dramatic decline in numbers. By the mid-seventies a government survey showed only 1,000 pandas remained in the wild.
Panda oasis
There are signs, however, that the panda — so long on the brink of extinction — is fighting back, thanks to improved panda protection measures by the Chinese government and non-governmental organizations, such as WWF (which has used the panda as its international symbol since its inception in 1961). Improved panda protection has included the establishment of nature reserves, which have become an oasis for the highly threatened species.
Today, there are more than 50 reserves over 10,400sq km, hosting two-thirds of the panda population. For 25 years, WWF has been supporting the reserves, particularly in the Minshan Mountains in Sichuan and Gansu provinces and in Qinling in Shaanxi province.
In the Wanglang nature reserve in the Minshan Mountains — at the foothills of the Tibetan Himalayas — WWF has equipped and trained dozens of rangers who regularly mount anti-poaching patrols over the reserve’s 320sq km of forests. Poaching, which incurs a ten-year jail sentence, is rare these days, although pandas have been known to get caught in traps set for other animals. The population in the reserve has stabilized at 32 after a high of 66 in the mid-1960s and a low of 19 in the 1970s. The main task of the staff has been to monitor the movements and behaviour of such an elusive and solitary animal.
“Like most of my colleagues here, I have never seen a panda face to face,” admits Chen Ai, a researcher from Beijing University who is spending six months at Wanglang. “But just the same, it’s a good feeling to know that one is not too far away.”
Researchers like Ai spend their days tracking the pandas by analyzing paw tracks, their distinctive bite marks on bamboo shoots, and even their droppings. Since last October, Chen Ai and the research team have had another tool in their panda protection toolbox — an infrared camera. With 30 cameras strapped to trees throughout the reserve — the first reserve in China to introduce them — catching a panda has just become a whole lot easier.
Leaping across crystal clear streams and bounding noiselessly through the thick bamboo undergrowth, Liang Chunping, a reserve ranger, retrieves a film in one of the hidden cameras. The cameras have struck lucky five times, snapping a couple of pandas in action.
“The cameras are helping us build up a picture of panda behaviour,” said Alan Carlson, a WWF species expert. “In another reserve pandas use to be fitted with radio collars but that was stopped after one died from suffocation. This technology is much more panda-friendly.”
The most recent national survey carried out by the Chinese authorities, with the support of WWF, revealed 1,600 pandas are left in the wild — over 40 per cent more than previously thought.
Due to improved monitoring methods, like the use of GPS and cameras, this is one of the most accurate surveys to date. But the increase in numbers does not mean that the panda is out of the woods yet.
A fragmented habitat
The mountain forests of south-west China where many pandas live are fragmented. Habitat destruction continues to pose a threat to many pandas, particularly those living outside the designated reserves. Today, only around 60 per cent of the population is under protection in reserves. As China’s economy continues its rapid development and population grows, it is more important than ever to ensure the giant panda’s survival.
“If we are to prevent some populations of pandas from dying out, we need to link up their fragmented habitats so that they can roam and meet new mates from a different gene pool,” said Carlson.
Panda corridors are slowly being created to link up some of the reserves. However, ensuring safe passage between corridors is becoming more difficult as economic development is happening at a faster pace. The construction of dams, as well as ever-expanding towns and villages, is intruding on panda habitat.
Although banned in parts of the country in 1998, logging still poses one of the greatest threats to the panda’s habitat. Because of China’s dense human population, many panda populations are isolated in narrow belts of bamboo forests. Even that is continuing to disappear as settlers push higher up the mountain slopes. Ironically, many locals who once worked in the logging industry have turned to poaching and gathering wild medicinal herbs as their sole way of eking out a living, further compounding the situation.
The Wanglang reserve is also surrounded by Baima villages, a minority tribal group of some 1,400 people who for centuries have depended on the forests as their main source of income.
“In the past relations with the Baima were not so good,” said the reserve’s manager, Chen Youping. “We were seen as the hated guardians of the forest, but now they greet us as friends.”
WWF and the reserve are helping the Baima develop alternative livelihoods to reduce pressure on the panda’s forest habitats, including the development of eco-tourism activities.
“Everyone used to be a logger, but now we are opening up our homes to tourists visiting the reserve who are keen to experience our traditional music and customs,” explained the head of the neighbouring Xiangshujia village, Li Qin, dressed in traditional costume.
In addition, WWF, through small loans, has helped village women set up a market for traditional embroidered bags, jackets, and table cloths.
Honey bear
Xia Baoyi, a wiry 61-year old logger-turned-beekeeper, has also benefited from WWF’s work in the region.
“They taught me how to protect the bees from winter frosts and prevent disease,” said Xia, tending to his 27 beehives on a hill overlooking the village. “When the weather is good, I can earn 1,000 yuan (US$125) which helps me supplement my son’s earnings as a goat herder.”
Xia’s honey, like that of other beekeepers, is sold at the Wanglang reserve to passing tourists. And thanks to a deal negotiated with the help of WWF, the honey is now being sold to Carrefour, Europe’s largest retailer, which has a strong presence in China.
Six villages near three panda reserves are also taking part in the Carrefour scheme. In Tai Ping Cun, a nearby village in Jiuzhaigou County where farmers still plough their fields with oxen, locals are growing walnuts, potatoes, and Chinese peppers for sale in four branches of Carrefour in Chengdu.
“Carrefour pays me six yuan per kilo for my walnuts,” said farmer Liu Yupmin. “I would get half that from a middleman.”
Antoine Bloch, a Carrefour manager in Chengdu, stresses that the scheme allows the company to put some thing back into the community.
“Selling is what we do best,” he said. “So offering new markets for this produce not only provides the villagers with a sustainable living but also helps conserve the forests and the panda.”
Carrefour has been a member of WWF China’s Corporate Partnership Programme since 2002. The programme offers businesses in China an opportunity to work together with WWF to improve the society and environment in which they do business.
“We hope that through WWF’s partnership with Carrefour, we can create market demand and a stable marketing channel for these products, and ultimately permanently improve the standard of living of these communities,” said Ding Jing, WWF China’s Corporate Partnership Manager.
“It is a win-win situation for everyone. By buying environmentally-friendly produce, the Chinese are really doing their bit to protect their national treasure, the giant panda.”
* Claire Doole is Head of Press at WWF International
NOTES:
”¢ A member of the bear family, the giant panda is the only species in its genus. Giant pandas have a white coat with black fur around their eyes, on their ears, muzzle, legs, and shoulders. The unique physical features of the species include broad, flat molars and an enlarged wrist bone that functions as an opposable thumb — both of these adaptations are used for holding, crushing, and eating bamboo. The animals have the digestive system of a carnivore, but they have adapted to a vegetarian diet and depend almost exclusively on bamboo as a food source. A giant panda can consume 12”“38kg of bamboo a day to meet its energy requirements.
Ӣ In 2004, the results of the most comprehensive survey of China's giant panda population revealed that there are nearly 1,600 pandas in the wild, over 40 per cent more animals than previously thought to exist. These findings came from a four-year-long study of pandas and their habitat carried out by the State Forestry Administration of China and WWF. The survey also provided information on where giant pandas are living and the condition of the forests and bamboo they depend upon. The survey discovered pandas living in regions not thought to have the species, and also pinpointed a number of threats to their long-term survival, including deforestation and continued poaching.
Source: WWF International
