WWF Launches Giant Panda Friends Club in China

A giant panda eats a pumpkin in the panda house in the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau Wild Zoo in Xining, capital of northwest China's Qinghai Province, June 16, 2019. (Xinhua/Zhang Long)

CHENGDU (Xinhua) — The World Wildlife Fund (WWF) launched a giant panda-friendly enterprise alliance Sunday in Chengdu, the capital of southwest China’s Sichuan Province.

The WWF launched the alliance, known as the Panda Friends Club, with Chinese e-commerce giant JD.com, which will promote a giant panda-friendly certification that aims to create sustainability for healthy panda ecosystems and economic development.

The certification requires products to be produced in the distribution area of wild giant pandas, meet the demand of sustainability during collection or cultivation, and be beneficial for giant panda protection and the development of local communities.

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The companies in the alliance can support the communities by purchasing the products.

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The value of the ecosystem of giant pandas and their habitats is as high as 6.9 billion U.S. dollars a year, 27 times the investment in giant panda protection, said Wei Fuwen, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Sichuan has 1,387 wild giants pandas and habitats covering 2.02 million hectares.