Giant pandas on loan to western Japan zoo set for home in June

All four giant pandas on loan to a zoo in western Japan will return to China around late June, the zoo operator said on Thursday, while two other giant pandas will continue living in Tokyo even afterwards.

The pandas — 24-year-old Rauhin and her offspring Yuihin (8), Saihin (6) and Fuhin (4) — will leave Adventure World amusement park in Shirahama, a resort town in Wakayama Prefecture, for the Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding in Sichuan province.

Their return follows an agreement between the zoo and the Chinese side, as their joint panda conservation project is set to expire in August.

Since launching the Japan-China joint research on giant panda breeding in 1994, Adventure World has seen the birth of 17 pandas, 16 of them fathered by Eimei, who arrived in Japan that year. Eimei returned to China in 2023 but passed away earlier this year.

Rauhin, the park's first cub, was born in 2000. The youngest of the group, Fuhin, was born in 2020.

The town of Shirahama attracts around 3.4 million tourists annually. When asked what they associate most with the area, visitors overwhelmingly point to Adventure World's panda family.

The pandas have become central to regional revitalization efforts, inspiring everything from bamboo lights made with the same bamboo they eat to panda-themed decor in local hotel rooms.

Although the four pandas will depart, two other giant pandas will remain in Japan — both at Tokyo's Ueno Zoological Gardens, which received its first pandas from China in 1972 to mark the normalization of diplomatic ties.

Contact the writers at jiangxueqing@chinadaily.com.cn