Conservation
A panda named Chi-Chi became the model for the WWF logo and, with it, the face of the whole conservation movement. Nature reserves, anti-poaching laws, and decades of habitat work slowly pulled the species back, from Endangered to Vulnerable, making the panda the rare icon that actually recovered.
Part of The Giant Panda
8 moments in this segment.
- - Chi-Chi arrives at London Zoo. A young female panda named Chi-Chi reaches London Zoo in 1958 and becomes a national darling, and the most-seen panda in the West. Her image, sketched by the conservationists who would soon found a new global wildlife charity, is about to become the most famous animal logo in the world.
- - The panda becomes the WWF symbol. When the World Wildlife Fund is founded in 1961, its founders, among them the artist and naturalist Sir Peter Scott, choose a giant panda for the logo, inspired by Chi-Chi at London Zoo. A black-and-white animal reproduces cheaply, and is beloved worldwide: the panda becomes the face of conservation itself.
- - Wolong National Nature Reserve established. China establishes the Wolong reserve in the mountains of Sichuan in 1963, one of the first protected areas created specifically for the giant panda. It grows into the heartland of panda conservation: a vast sanctuary of bamboo forest and, later, the country's flagship breeding centre.
- - Downgraded from Endangered to Vulnerable. In 2016 the IUCN Red List reclassifies the giant panda from "Endangered" to "Vulnerable," citing a steady rise in the wild population after decades of habitat protection. It is a landmark: proof that sustained, well-funded conservation can actually bring a species back.
- - China declares the panda no longer endangered. In July 2021 China officially announces that the giant panda is no longer endangered, only "vulnerable," with wild numbers passing 1,800. Sixty years of reserves, replanting, and breeding have made the panda the world's most successful flagship conservation story.
- - Released into the wild. A fifty-minute documentary following two giant pandas through the process of being returned to the wild, set against China's national park programme. It is the part of the conservation effort that the panda nursery exists to feed.
- - Fifty years of the Washington programme. Brandie Smith of the Smithsonian's National Zoo discusses the collaboration that began when Ling-Ling and Hsing-Hsing arrived after President Nixon's 1972 visit to China. She describes what half a century of joint work has produced.
- - A ranger in the Daxiangling mountains. A team of rangers patrols the Daxiangling range in Sichuan, a sanctuary for the giant panda and many other species. The film follows one of them who left the city for the remote mountain community that does this work.
