PANDA DREAM STILL BURNING

MAYOR Tom Tate’s play to get pandas to the Gold Coast from China is more than a decade in the making.

Back in 2006, Currumbin Sanctuary gave China six koalas and access to experts on its staff to shepherd the Aussie marsupials into a life of comfort that hopefully would produce cute and cuddly offspring. Within a year the koala ambassadors had produced four joeys, including rare twins, at the Xiangjiang Safari Park near Guangzhou, sending China and koala-watchers everywhere into a frenzy.

In return, the Gold Coast was expected to get two rare giant pandas. To most people’s surprise, however, the city was duped and the animals, called Wang Wang and Funi, were snaffled by Howard government foreign minister Alexander Downer and instead went to his own home city of Adelaide.

The deal involved a 10-year loan to Adelaide Zoo where the pandas would hopefully breed. They didn’t and the experiment fell flat.

Mayor Tate revived the idea in late 2014 while conducting talks with leaders in Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan Province, to sign a friendly city agreement and discuss the future relationship between the tourist regions.

The deal will allow for greater economic trade with the city as well as educational, medical and cultural exchanges.

The city is also home to one of the world’s premier panda breeding grounds, the Chengdu Panda Base. It started with six giant pandas in 1987 and has been pivotal in helping to almost double the number of bears alive in the wild today.

“Sichuan is world-class in terms of protecting endangered species such as the giant panda and so is the Gold Coast in terms of our protection of koalas,” Cr Tate said in late 2014.

“I love the giant panda and I told (the executive vice mayor) I do not know the exchange rate but I said I could give six koalas for a panda. Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary absolutely could have a couple of pandas there.”

However, it was tempered by Currumbin Sanctuary chief executive Jonathan Fisher who, while excited by the idea, warned the road to welcoming a pair of pandas could be rocky.

“I applaud the idea of getting Chinese investment coming into the Gold Coast and Currumbin would obviously work with the city in trying to improve the attractions here,” he said at the time.

“However, while pandas are a beautiful animal, they are expensive to provide the right housing and a long-term agreement would be costly. We would be happy to be part of the discussions but it is a long way off before anything could happen.”

Any deal to properly house pandas here will be costly.

But there is little doubt they would be a hit on the Gold Coast. The city is the nation’s tourism capital and – given the reputation and work of wildlife warriors such as Currumbin Sanctuary – is proven at providing world-class care for exotic animals.

Besides, the Gold Coast has a history of chasing, and achieving, the unthinkable – even if it does take more than a decade.