Why the giant Panda is endangered. The giant panda bear population has been decreasing for thousands of years, less that 1000 pandas survive in the wild each year. It is estimated that at this rate the Panda bear will be extinct by the year of 2050. This is because of the hunting and poaching by humans and climate change. The bear was already considered rare by ancient China. Chinese researchers have discovered that the giant Panda population has actually stayed stable for twenty years.

The loss of habitat is a huge problem in the endangerment of the Pandas. People are trying to stop the logging in Panda habitat and poaching. Giant Pandas die of hunger and starvation because of logging. They can not get or reach the food they need to survive. The bamboo is cut down and dies off, and trees with other food are just being cut down and taken away. Poachers are hunting for the hide of the Panda just to sell and get rich off of it. Pandas are also accidentally killed by poachers who are poaching for Musk Deer. One more thing is that Pandas have only one baby in a long period of time. A female Panda holds a baby for a minimum of 150 days.

Wild giant Pandas are only found in Southwestern China. They live in only six small forest fragments in the provinces of Sichuan, Gansu, and Shaanxi, which is only 5,400 square miles. They inhabit damp, misty forests of bamboo and conifers. Their preferred habitat has a lot of bamboo shoots. The Panda is under the highest category of legal protection. The government has declared a band to logging. Before the Criminal Law of China was revised in 1997, a person convicted of Panda poaching could receive the death penalty or be executed. Now the most severe penalty for poaching Pandas is over ten years in prison. One of the most asked questions is, "Can cloning save the Pandas?" Actually cloning probably could save the Pandas, but if Pandas were cloned the clones would be unnatural, therefore the government and science laboratories refuse to clone the Panda.