WASHINGTON >> Giant pandas are everywhere at Washington, D.C.’s National Zoo. Three live in the zoo’s $50 million Asia Trail. T-shirts, trucker hats, and refrigerator magnets bear their image. A 24-hour panda cam broadcasts the trio’s every move. Even the QR code to reserve zoo tickets features a panda silhouette.
Now, after more than 50 years, Washington’s pandas are going away — and perhaps for good.
The zoo’s three pandas are set to return to China by December with the expiration of a three-year agreement with China’s wildlife agency in that month. This is not just the U.S. capital’s situation. The three other U.S. zoos that have Chinese pandas — Atlanta, San Diego, and Memphis — have either already returned their pandas or will see them go back to China by the end of next year.
Although both parties deny that politics played a role, China has long employed “Panda Diplomacy” to gain favor, reward supporters, and penalize opponents. The loss of America’s last pandas comes at a time when relations between the U.S. and China are historically strained, with most avenues of cooperation severed.
Similarly, any hope of Washington receiving new pandas hinges on recent signs that relations might be improving — or at the very least, not worsening.
“It holds significance that all pandas in the United States will be back in China by next year,” says Elena Songster, a professor at Saint Mary’s College of California and the author of “Panda Nation,” a book about China’s panda policy. “They have a plan. They know what they’re doing.”
The tug-of-war over pandas partly reflects the peculiar way in which they appear in zoos worldwide. Zoos do not have full ownership of pandas. Instead, they rent them and sign contracts to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars annually to China.
After years of renewing these contracts, the Smithsonian Institution, which oversees Washington’s zoo, was unable to do so again. Earlier this year, the departure of the Memphis Zoo’s panda, Ya Ya, sparked nationalist fervor back home, including allegations of mistreatment, after images showed the panda looking emaciated and its fur appearing mangy. Despite the U.S. and China claiming the panda was healthy, it returned to China in April.
The U.S. was initially granted pandas after former President Richard Nixon normalized relations in 1972, with many other nations following suit. A 2013 study found a correlation between uranium deals and panda loans to Canada and France. In 2018, China loaned pandas to Finland to commemorate the centennial of Finnish independence.
“From goodwill gestures in Nixon-era diplomacy, they have turned into symbols of discord today,” says Lizzi C. Lee, a fellow at the Chinese Economy program at the Asia Society Policy Institute. “Pandas have become platforms for narratives of distrust and rivalry.”
There are numerous non-political reasons why the pandas may be returning home now. One explanation is that the pandas leaving U.S. zoos have reached the age when they would naturally return home. The departure of some pandas was delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, which also disrupted China’s loan system.
With pandas no longer classified as endangered, China is establishing its own network of national parks and may not feel the need to send them abroad for conservation and breeding.
What the future holds for the Washington zoo remains uncertain. The relocation could be temporary, as happened in 1999 when the zoo went a year without pandas, considering that the pandas are nearing the age when they would typically return home. Alternatively, China may offer them as a reward in a future diplomatic negotiation.
TENTATIVE SIGNS
Both China and the U.S. have left the door open for a possible return. This aligns with the tentative signs of a reversal in the steep decline of relations.
President Joe Biden’s goal is to have a face-to-face meeting with President Xi Jinping, something that has not occurred in almost a year. Xi is expected to attend the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation forum in San Francisco this year, and he may bring with him the promise of more pandas for American zoos.
A spokesperson for the National Zoo declined to comment on whether new discussions are underway. However, a person familiar with the Biden administration’s thinking indicated that the U.S. plans to address the issue with China before Washington’s pandas go home.
China’s embassy in Washington has also left room for a positive outcome.
“We have achieved many positive results in breeding, disease prevention and control, technical exchanges, and public awareness,” says embassy spokesman Liu Pengyu. He adds that the two sides are “engaged in communication regarding future collaboration on giant panda conservation and research.”
Visitors to the zoo had a more straightforward response to the pandas’ imminent departure. Among them was Elizabeth Thoms, a stay-at-home mom from Silver Spring, Maryland, who brought her son and daughter to the zoo for the second time in a month this week after learning that the pandas would be going home.
“According to my daughter, they’re the most special thing in the zoo — and coming from a four-year-old, that’s a significant compliment,” says Thoms.
Her daughter, Nat, giggles as she watches the National Zoo’s youngest panda, Xiao Qi Ji, attempt — and fail — to climb a tree.
“They’re goofballs,” she says.
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