Giant Panda National Park, a step towards streamlining protected areas and cohesive conservation management in China

Abstract

The Chinese government recently finalized a plan to establish a Giant Panda National Park in 2020, one of the first national parks in the country. The plan will extend protection status to a significant amount of areas that were previously unprotected; it will also bring many of the existing giant panda protected areas under one authority in order to improve effectiveness and reduce inconsistencies in management. We provide an overview of the history and status of giant panda conservation and the rationale for creating the park. We also give first-hand information on details of the park design, including its general objectives, geographic range, zone divisions, management and funding structure, as well as analysis of the challenges and opportunities ahead. As a new conservation model for China, the Giant Panda National Park has the ambitious goal of standardizing conservation across a large region. It is a major step toward significantly expanding the amount of area protected and establishing a cohesive conservation network for a sustainable giant panda population in the wild.