Hard disagree. It's a very expensive species to keep, needs quite a bit of space, isn't conservation-dependant, and is quite boring. The main reason that zoos have it is political, the country saying they're buddy-buddy with China. The only zoo in the Netherlands to have them is the rich-person-owned Ouwehands, the worst of the Dutch big zoos.
Big panda conservation is not needed outside of China, and China only uses the Giant panda's fame to get money from other countries that they claim is for nature conservation, but ended up being used for infrastructure and other... more unethical projects.
If there were to be imported animals, I'd MUCH rather see animals like Pangolins from Taipei or Singapore, Brazilian mergansers from Itaiba, or Crested ibises from Tokyo
I don't think income is the biggest issue, it's the malmanagement as of late. Projects that broke down far too quickly, constant new promises of designs that never come to fruition, letter older builds stagnate and break down over time, and rarely building anything to last (both physically and conceptually). They also tend to alienate their audience by, for example, only serving vegan food and constantly talking about it like that's an amazing development, rather than greenwashing and making things more difficult for people with allergies.
On this we do agree, sacrificing great things like the giant Asian aviary, the Indian rhinos and the gorillas for an elephant upgrade that isn't all that needed is an extremely strange choice, especially since there are other animals and exhibits much more in need of an upgrade (Pygmy hippos, black rhinos, Vicunas, the victoria conservatory, etc)
I originally thought that this was a community of zoo lovers, away from the murky international politics of recent years, but it seems that I am still childish, which is not something that people of my age should be.
Okay, I know where you said that the Chinese government used the money from pandas for infrastructure construction. I originally thought that any mature adult would not take this illogical report seriously, but now it seems that many people believe it.
Let me briefly explain that the annual rent of a panda is about 500,000 to 1 million US dollars. There are currently about 50-60 pandas living in non-Chinese areas. I will take the maximum value, which is that the Chinese government can earn 60 million US dollars from it every year. 60 million US dollars is a lot of money for an individual, but the question is what is this money for China? A country with 9.6 million square kilometers, 1.4 billion people, and the longest flight route takes 6.5 hours. What can 60 million US dollars do? China has the world's longest high-speed railway network, and the cost per kilometer is about 24 million US dollars, which means that all the money combined cannot build 3 kilometers of high-speed railway.
So, can anyone tell me, what is 60 million dollars for China? Does it need this money to build infrastructure?
Whenever I see some media articles without logic, I feel really sad. Some people blatantly deceive ordinary people for some purposes. Sometimes, China is the most evil country in the world, so powerful that it must force the people of some countries to pay more taxes to expand its military. Then sometimes, China is so poor that it needs to rent dozens of pandas to build infrastructure. What I want to know is, how many Chinas are there in the world?
In that report, a zoo director who couldn't afford the rent for pandas was complaining about something, and then the author of the report said "he has reliable information that China uses the rent for pandas for infrastructure." This is really ridiculous. I can also say that I have reliable information that there are many humanoid creatures on Pluto. Anyway, I don't need to prove whether the source of my information is reliable or whether there is circumstantial evidence.
Finally, the two parties who rented pandas were completely voluntary. China did not drive warships to the territorial waters of other countries like some countries in the world, and then bombarded them and forced them to buy their products. And China has not forced ordinary people around the world to like this animal, right?
Another point, all the Crested Ibis in Japan come from China, understand? The Crested Ibis that bred in Japan became extinct in 2003. Currently, all the Crested Ibis in the world are descendants of the 7 Crested Ibis found in Yangxian County, Shaanxi Province, China, all from China, and these are the results of China's rescue work for the animal. The cooperation between China and Japan on the Crested Ibis project also proves how ridiculous those illogical reports are. Obviously, the cooperation between different countries has done a lot of right things, but those media with ulterior motives just turn a blind eye.
I understand the care and love for animals, but I think we can't easily believe what the media says. Over the years, they have deceived ordinary people too many times. China currently has a visa-free policy for many countries. If you still have doubts about whether China needs the funds for a few animals to build infrastructure, I think you can go to China to take a look. The cost is definitely lower than the cost of traveling in most European countries.
