Popular panda under threat

Press, 5 December 1988, Page 15

Popular panda under threat

The panda has captured the hearts of millions around the world, with its lovable cuddly image and its mega-star media coverage. But there is a darker side to the popularity of the animals. “Our World: Save the Panda” tonight (at 7 on One) asks whether international efforts to breed the panda and preserve its habitat will be enough to safeguard its future. The giant panda was once plentiful throughout China’s mountainous bamboo forests, but hunting, illegal exporting of the animal and a gradual erosion of its staple food — bamboo shoots — have meant that numbers have declined. The intrusion of man into the panda’s environment, with the inevitable destruction of its habitat and primary food source,

has done the most damage. Numbers that were on the decline are now critically low, with estimates that only about 1000 pandas remain. The panda is an extremely shy creature, and the intrusion of man has driven it even further away, causing it to abandon its feeding grounds and head for remote and often barren areas where bamboo is not plentiful. Breeding-in-captivity programmes have had little success. Artificial insemination programmes have had better results, but progress is still painfully slow. In tonight’s programme, rare footage of pandas shot by cameramen in their wild and natural habitat show just how shy and playful these creatures really are.