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Bidding farewell to the Adventure World Park Zoo in Japan, giant panda Xiongbang arrived in Beijing Monday noon, setting foot in his ancestral home for the first time in his life.

 

Lan Jingchao, a zoologist from the Chengdu Giant Panda Breeding and Research Center, who escorted Xiongbang on board the plane, said the two-year-old male giant panda is in good condition and was at ease throughout the three-hour flight.

A Japanese zoologist also accompanied the panda on his trip back home.

 

After an overnight quarantine, Xiongbang is expected to leave for the Giant Panda Breeding and Research Center in Chengdu, capital of southwest China's Sichuan Province on Tuesday morning, said Lan.

 

Xiongbang was born to Yongming and Meimei, a panda couple leased by China to the Adventure World Park Zoo in western Japan's Wakayama prefecture in 1994 and 2000 respectively. The now 88.6-kglively "boy" has grown from a baby cub weighing merely 190 grams.

 

Xiongbang was the first male giant panda born in a foreign land to return to China this year, and he is also the first offspring born by the artificially-bred pandas in winter as a panda is usually in heat during spring and delivers babies in summer or fall, said Yu Jianqiu, deputy head with the giant panda breeding and research center.

 

In February 2004, a female panda, Huamei, born in the United States, returned to the prestigious Wolong Nature Reserve in Sichuan Province.

 

Xiongbang was one of the 23 pandas residing overseas, according to the statistics released by the State Forestry Administration (SFA) early this month.

 

During a 25-year period from 1957 to 1982, China presented a total of 24 giant pandas as gifts to nine nations. In 1985, however, it decided to offer no more giant pandas as gifts and instead, the endangered animal can only go abroad by means of leasing and their cubs born on any foreign soil belong to China.

 

A solemn handover ceremony was held in the Adventure World Park Zoo on Sunday and a delegation led by Ma Jinchuan, deputy director of the Chengdu City Gardening Bureau, was present at the ceremony.

 

Xiongbang was sent to the Kansai International Airport in Osakaat 4 a.m. (Beijing Time) and got on abroad around 9 a.m. Monday. The zoo prepared fresh bamboo for him, said Teruaki Hayashi, head of the breeding department of the Japanese zoo.

 

The panda won deep favor of Japanese people and Xiongbang had a lot of fans. Together with the whale, the panda was the emblem of the zoo, said Teruaki Hayashi.

 

"We are sorry to bid farewell to him, and we will miss him of course. But we still hope he will enjoy the life in his hometown," he said.

 

Male pandas usually become sexually mature at five to six years old, so Xiongbang will not immediately join China's giant panda breeding plan after his return home but he very likely will receive sex education first, said Yu.

 

"Our center will provide a fit living environment for Xiongbang and arrange the most experienced panda keepers to take care of this 'honored guest' -- we are sure to be able to make him feel really at home," he said.

 

Currently, Japan's Adventure World Park is home to six pandas, the largest panda population living outside China. And the Chengdu Giant Panda Breeding and Research Center has also established a foreign branch in the park.

 

Xiongbang was one of twins born by the nine-year-old Meimei. Unfortunately, his twin was stillborn. Before the birth of Xiongbang, Meimei gave birth to a female cub, called Liangbang, at the Adventure World Park on Sept. 6, 2000, after being artificially inseminated in China.

 

Pandas, listed among the world's most endangered wildlife species that are on the verge of distinction, have been taken by the Chinese people as "national gems."

 

Statistics from the SFA released on June 8 showed the number of pandas at large in northwestern and southwestern China rose by over 40 percent to 1,590 over the mid-1980s, whereas a total of 161 were in captive breeding programs worldwide.

 

While the panda population is on the rise, the existence of the animal, which subsists on rare, special type of wild bamboo leaves, is still under the menace of a loss of habitat, grave poaching and low reproduction rate. Also, groups of pandas live far from each other, making them hard to breed.

 

As a crucial part of its unfailing efforts to keep this black and white "gem" that has existed since the dinosaur era from disappearing, China has carried out a series of programs on panda research and breeding with other countries.

 

"The most successful and highly influential case in point worldwide is the cooperation on artificially breeding pandas launched by the Adventure World Park and our center. And Xiongbang is a fine example," acknowledged Yu, who added that so far, the two sides have bred four pandas in Japan successfully.

This file photo dated December 27, 2001 shows the "mother" Meimei taking care of Xiongbang, a baby cub newly born to her, in Japan.

 

This file photo dated December 26, 2001 shows the "son" Xiongbang in Japan. The photo was taken only a few days after Xiongbang was born.

 

(Xinhua News Agency June 22, 2004)