On Thursday, the China Wildlife Conservation Association announced it had agreed with France’s Beauval Zoo to extend their international cooperation on giant panda conservation with the aim of boosting Sino-French exchanges.
According to the group’s statement, the two giant pandas are expected to arrive at the zoo in Saint-Aignan in central France in 2027 for a 10-year cooperation period.
In 2012, the Beauval Zoo welcomed pandas Huan Huan and Yuan Zi under a Sino-French cooperative research agreement.
The two 17-year-old pandas were returned to China last month because of Huan Huan’s chronic kidney disease, a common condition in bears around her age.
On Friday, Brigitte Macron, France’s first lady, visited the Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding after a tour of one of the world’s oldest and still functioning irrigation systems in the city of Dujiangyan.
