China’s Li Qiang promises Australia more pandas: ‘pick a pair’

Li visited Adelaide Zoo, which has been home to China-born giant pandas Wang Wang and Fu Ni since 2009, before heading for lunch at a restaurant at Adelaide winery Penfolds Magill Estate.

He announced that the zoo would be loaned another two pandas after the pair are due to return to China in November.

“China will soon provide another pair of pandas that are equally beautiful, lively, cute and younger to the Adelaide Zoo, and continue the cooperation on giant pandas between China and Australia,” Li said in Mandarin, adding that zoo staff would be invited to “pick a pair”.

Li was impressed by the 18-year-old male Wang Wang’s appetite and indifference to his high-ranking visitors.

“The panda is very obsessed with eating and doesn’t pay attention to us even when we are the people from its hometown visiting,” Li said at the panda enclosure.

“It has completely treated here as its second hometown,” Li said. “Very pretty, adorable, with charming naivety.”

The pair are the only pandas in the Southern Hemisphere and failed to produce offspring in Australia.

Foreign Minister Penny Wong thanked Li for ensuring that pandas would remain the zoo’s star attraction.

“It’s good for the economy, it’s good for South Australian jobs, it’s good for tourism, and it is a signal of goodwill, and we thank you,” Wong said.

Tom King, the managing director of Penfolds, one of Australia’s oldest wineries, told Chinese state media ahead of Li’s arrival that such visits helped strengthen economic and cultural ties.

“It’s pleasing to see the stabilising of relations between the Australian and Chinese governments, including regular high-level visits between the two countries,” King was quoted as saying by the Global Times newspaper last week.

Li noted that