Belgium bids an emotional farewell to three giant pandas

Belgium has bid farewell to three giant pandas who are now making their way to China. An estimated 1,500 people traveled to the Pairi Daiza zoo, located roughly 50 kilometers from Brussels, to say goodbye.

The pandas – Tian Bao and his twin siblings Bao Mei and Bao Di, all of whom were born at the zoo – were given a guard of honor on their way out, with crowds given a final opportunity to see the pandas before they were secured in boxes, loaded onto trucks and taken to the airport.

"My heart exploded when I saw them leaving but at the same time, that's life, kids grow up and they leave the nest and they go around the world and now they are going for new adventures in China so it's beautiful," said one visitor – who was also at the zoo the day the pandas first arrived in 2014.

The Pairi Daiza zoo signed a 15-year panda conservation agreement with China in 2013. Under the arrangement Belgium received two pandas, Hao Hao and Xing Hui. Hao Hao gave birth to male cub Tian Bao at Pairi Daiza in 2016, followed by twins Bao Mei and Bao Di in 2019. 

As part of the original deal, any offspring would return to China when they turned four years old. That timeline was impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic, meaning that the three children have stayed in Belgium longer than originally planned. 

Cooperation and preservation 

In the 1980s just 1,100 giant pandas lived in the wild, but today that figure is closer to 1,900. China's Ambassador to Belgium, Fei Shengchao, says the relocation of the three pandas is a celebration of conservation efforts.

"It's cooperation between nations," he said. "It's cooperation between different peoples and more importantly it's about what humankind and nations can do together to better protect our home planet."

The pandas were last on display to the public a month ago and have been in quarantine ever since. Visitors coming to see the pandas for a final time had to wear face masks to avoid contamination. The three pandas will also have to spend a minimum of a month in quarantine when they arrive in China too.

"They're in good shape," said Pairi Daiza's head vet Alicia Quievy. "They're not sick, of course, but it's specifically to not send all around the world different kinds of disease. It's why the quarantine period is really important."

The three pandas may have left the zoo, but their parents will stay until at least 2029. The breeding program will restart soon with the hope that those here may be able to welcome some new faces at some stage in the future.