Chinese zoologists have called for urgent efforts to rescue and protect a newly identified subspecies of giant pandas living in the Qinling Mountains in north China's Shaanxi Province.

Zoologists with the Shaanxi Provincial Forestry Bureau (SPFB) said that the Qinling pandas are more critically endangered than those living in the southwestern province of Sichuan, a major habitat of the rare creatures.

The number of Qinling pandas is estimated at just 300, while more than 1,300 non-Qinling pandas live elsewhere in China.

Wang Wanyun, chief of the Wild Animals Protection Section of the SPFB, said that the bureau would draft policies for protecting Qinling pandas and would establish research and artificial breeding centers.

A research group headed by Professor Fang Shengguo of the prestigious Zhejiang University in east China recently compared the pandas living in Sichuan Province and the Qinling Mountains. They concluded that the two subspecies have lived in different geographical areas for at least 50,000 years.

Qinling pandas have smaller skeletons and larger molars than their Sichuan cousins, according to Fang. Also, the Qinling pandas have dark brown spots on the chest and brown hair on the belly, while Sichuan pandas have black spots on the chest and white hair on the belly.

Wang Wanyun said that while all pandas need protection, the small number of Qinling pandas puts them at greater risk.

Giant pandas are considered a national treasure of China. About 1,590 giant pandas live in the wild, mostly in the high mountains around the Sichuan Basin, and 160 live in captivity.

The central and provincial governments have invested 160 million yuan (US$19.3 million) into panda protection programs since 1992. China built its first natural preserve for giant pandas and began to ban poaching in the 1950s. The pandas have been under state protection since 1962.  

(Xinhua News Agency February 17, 2005)