All 4 giant pandas at western Japan zoo to return to China in June
All four giant pandas on loan to a western Japan zoo will return to China around late June, ahead of the expiration of their lease agreement, the zoo operator said Thursday.
The 24-year-old Rauhin and her children -- Yuihin, 8, Saihin, 6, and Fuhin, 4 -- will leave Adventure World amusement park in Shirahama, Wakayama Prefecture, for their new home at the Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding in China's Sichuan Province, according to the operator.
The Wakayama park began a breeding cooperation program with the Chinese panda research base in 1994 and was home to Eimei, who came to Japan on loan in 1994.
While in Wakayama, he fathered 10 cubs with Rauhin and another six with a different female giant panda. Eimei was returned to China in 2023 and died earlier this year.
The departure of the four pandas would mean only two giant pandas will be left in Japan.
The two pandas are currently based at Tokyo's Ueno Zoological Gardens. The Ueno zoo received its first pandas in 1972 from China to commemorate the normalization of bilateral ties.
Related coverage:
Giant panda Eimei dies in China after repatriation from Japan
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