Bear-faced greed?
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Lending spree
The practice of lending out pandas began in the 1980's. More than 10 wild pandas were lent to zoos in Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York, San Diego and Toronto between 1984 and 1988. Other countries, including Japan and the UK, also signed panda lending agreements with China, the report said.
![A boy poses for a photo in front of a stuffed giant panda at Tokyo's Ueno Zoo Friday. People are getting ready to welcome two giant pandas arriving Monday. [Global Times]](http://images.china.cn/attachement/jpg/site1007/20110221/0014222d98500ecc6e7112.jpg "A boy poses for a photo in front of a stuffed giant panda at Tokyo's Ueno Zoo Friday. People are getting ready to welcome two giant pandas arriving Monday. [Global Times]") |
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A boy poses for a photo in front of a stuffed giant panda at Tokyo's Ueno Zoo Friday. People are getting ready to welcome two giant pandas arriving Monday. [Global Times] |
George Schaller, an animal expert, said China earned at least $100,000 for lending out each panda during that period, while zoos overseas used the animal to boost their reputation, the report said.
Today, the UK-based Royal Zoological Society of Scotland has become the latest to draw the ire of activists after it signed a panda research agreement with CWCA on February 10.
The agreement was soon criticized by Will Travers, chief executive officer of the UK-based Born Free Foundation, an international wildlife charity, for spending millions of pounds to lease pandas for commercial purposes.
"In a time when everyone is tightening their belts, and with the prospect of cuts to essential services, the zoo should not be asking taxpayers to pay a penny toward this unnecessary and foolhardy venture," said Travers, who thinks that "Scotland does not need pandas any more than pandas need Scotland."
He called the plan "little more than animal exploitation," UK-based Deadline News Agency reported January 23.
The CEO said the Chinese government does not need the money either and hopes they will review the whole "loan a panda" enterprise and abandon it in favor of increasing domestic efforts to secure a long-term, wild future for giant pandas in their natural habitat.
A spokesperson of the Chinese embassy in the UK told the Global Times earlier that China is com-mitted to the protection of pandas, and the conservation cooperation with the UK will be conducive to the protection of the rare species.
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