In 1984, China ended panda gifts, switching to a policy of high-priced loans. This history has made Mexico one of a few countries able to keep locally born panda cubs.
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Her name is Xin Xin, and she's one of only three pandas in the world not owned by China. But these may be the final day's of Mexico's half-century panda love affair. Mexico's last giant panda, Xin Xin, lounges in her habitat at the Chapultepec Zoo in Mexico City.
China technically owns every panda in the world. The pandas are rented to zoos throughout the world for sometimes as much as one million dollars per year.
The animals are native to China. Xin Xin is a second-generation Mexican-born panda, with a lineage linked to Pe Pe and Ying Ying, who arrived at the zoo in 1975.
Panda diplomacy is the practice of sending giant pandas from China to other countries as a tool of diplomacy. From 1941 to 1984, China gave a gift of pandas to other countries. After a change in policy in 1984, pandas were leased instead of given as a gift.
In 1984, China ended panda gifts, switching to a policy of high-priced loans. This history has made Mexico one of a few countries able to keep locally born panda cubs. Since 1985, the loan program has required that zoos return any cubs to China.
The Chapultepec Zoo in Mexico City is unique in that it's two giant panda residents, Xin Xin and Shuan Shuan are the only giant pandas in the world not owned by China.
With diplomatic tensions running high between Beijing and a number of Western governments, China appears to be gradually pulling back its pandas from multiple Western zoos as their agreements expire.
American zoos do not actually own the pandas that we enjoy going to visit. China rents pandas out to the tune of $1 million a year. Zoos typically sign a 10-year contract, which means that at the end of that contract, a zoo will have spent $10 million renting one panda. And any cubs that are born while at the zoo?
Twenty-eight of the 60 are in 10 European zoos. Most zoos have 2 or 3 pandas. The zoos with the most pandas are Adventure World in Japan with 6 and Pairi Daiza in Belgium with 5. Chiang Mai Zoo in Thailand is the only zoo with a single panda.
The Chinese government, which gifted the first pair of pandas — Hsing Hsing and Ling Ling — to the U.S., now leases the pandas out for a typical 10-year renewable term. The annual fee ranges from $1 million to $2 million per pair, plus mandatory costs to build and maintain facilities to house the animals.
Three US zoos currently host giant pandas: the Smithsonian National Zoo in Washington DC has three, the Memphis Zoo in Tennessee has one and Zoo Atlanta in Georgia has four.