Zoo Atlanta has started preliminary design work on an expansion of its giant panda complex, four months after the last of its pandas left for China.
The project covers the Arthur M. Blank Family Foundation Giant Panda Conservation Center in the zoo’s Asian Forest Zone. Zoo Atlanta said on February 19, 2025 that it had initiated the preliminary design phase in anticipation of a future giant panda agreement with partners in China.
No such agreement is in place. The zoo said it is engaging in dialogue with partners in China about a future panda program, and that with nothing signed, additional details are not available.
The end of the first agreement
Zoo Atlanta’s original giant panda loan agreement with China expired in October 2024, the same year that marked the 25th anniversary of the zoo’s panda program.
The four pandas still in Atlanta at that point, original pair Lun Lun and Yang Yang and their two youngest offspring Ya Lun and Xi Lun, departed for China on October 12, 2024. All four now live at the Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding, as do Lun Lun and Yang Yang’s five earlier offspring.
What comes next
Zoo Atlanta said it will communicate additional updates as they become available, and pointed readers to the Panda Program FAQs on its website for more on the program.
