In the decade spanning from 2004 to 2014, the population of the giant panda in the wild increased from 1,596 to 1,864, a rise of 17 percent, according to the IUCN in its report.
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“This rate of population loss is nearly three times above that which qualifies a species as Critically Endangered”, they warn.
The cornerstones of the Chinese government’s effort to bring back its fuzzy, black-and-white national icon have included an intense effort to replant bamboo forests, which provide food and shelter for the bears.
Grauer’s Gorilla, one of the Eastern Gorilla subspecies, has experienced a fall in population from 16,900 individuals in 1994 to an estimated 3,800 past year.
“Illegal hunting and habitat loss are still major threats driving many mammal species towards extinction”, said Carlo Rondinini, coordinator of the mammal assessment at Sapienza University of Rome. “It shows that the Chinese government has made great efforts to protect endangered species, which can serve as a good example for the protection of endangered species worldwide”, said Wei Fuwen, a senior researcher at the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), in an interview with People’s Daily Online.
But there was some bad news.
It is miserable to see that four out of the six great age species, which are the western gorilla, eastern gorilla, Sumatran orangutan and Bornean orangutan are all listed as critically endangered.
Decades of conservation work in China have paid off for the giant panda, whose status was changed Sunday from “endangered” to “vulnerable” due to a population rebound, officials said. The typical full-grown adult male eastern gorilla weighs 140-205.5 kg and has 1,7 m (5.6 ft.) height.
IUCN’s Red List of Threatened Species assessed ailuropoda melanoleuca, the scientific name of the giant panda, as a rare species in investigations ranging from 1965 to 1988.
For half a century the Giant Panda has been a symbol of global attempts to preserve wildlife.
Chimpanzees and bonobos are listed as endangered. The Mountain Gorilla, which is the other subspecies, has only 880 individuals remaining, though its population has slightly increased over the past year.
“The story of hope that this down-listing tells is a reminder that if we work together, we can recover species from the brink of extinction”, Owen said.
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In Hawaii, about 90 percent of native plants are threatened with extinction because of invasive species like rats, pigs and non-native plants, the IUCN said.
