CHENGDU -- Sichuan Province, a native home to giant panda in southwest China, has released a total of 11 captive pandas into the wild since 2012, and 9 of them have survived, according to the Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding.

China's National Giant Panda Conservation and Research Center in Chengdu released the first captive panda, two-year-old Tao Tao, into the wild in Sichuan in October 2012.
"Now more than 70 percent of the giant pandas in China have formed small regional populations. About 33 of these populations are at risk of extinction. We reintroduce giant pandas born in captivity back into the wild just to directly replenish the quantity of these regional small populations, so as to obtain genetic diversity and expand these populations," said Ma Rui, assistant researcher with animal protection and research department of the Chengdu base.
Restoring the wild population is the ultimate goal of giant panda conservation. Through reintroducing pandas to the wild, along with other measures, the wild population of this precious animal species in China has increased from 1,114 in the 1980s to 1,864 now.
"Our next work plan is to collect DNA samples by large quantities at the release sites through non-destructive methods to verify if these pandas have had offspring and if the reintroduction program has pushed the expansion of the local panda populations," said Zhang Mingchun, head of the field ecology studies of the National Giant Panda Conservation and Research Center.