Lumi and Pyry


' and ' are giant pandas from China that were loaned to Ähtäri Zoo in Finland.
In the spring of 2016, it was announced that the Ähtäri Zoo could rent giant pandas from China in honor of the centenary of Finland's independence. In 2018, there were approximately 2,020 pandas in the wild and about 400 in captivity. Through China's panda diplomacy program, giant pandas are loaned to multiple European countries in addition to Finland, including Belgium, the Netherlands, Austria and France. The twelve million euro, fifteen-year agreement for renting pandas between Ähtäri Zoo and the National Panda Administration of China was signed in April 2017.
The pandas were considered an important foreign policy project in Finland, and their arrival in Finland was mentioned as the result of an agreement between the President of the Republic, Sauli Niinistö, and the General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, Xi Jinping.
The maintenance of giant pandas is expensive, and the zoo faced financial difficulties due to a lack of government funding. The zoo decided to return the pandas early to China in late 2024.

Background

On 16 April 2016, representatives Anne Kalmari and Teuvo Hakkarainen of the nine-member travelled to Beijing and Shanghai for a week to discuss agriculture and forestry issues, food production and the promotion of Finnish exports.
They met with Chen Fengxuen, deputy minister of forest management responsible for pandas, to discuss forestry issues. The panda project, which had been in negotiations for a long time, "came as an extra point on the discussion list". Kalmari expressed to Keskisuomalainen that an agreement was 99,9% sure.
Construction of the Ähtäri panda house began in February 2017. The interior space was about 2,400 square meters and the outdoor yard was about 3,000 square meters. Indoor conditions were challenging because it is a greenhouse-type climate. The humidity and air temperature in the enclosure were precisely controlled to keep the vegetation in good condition.
The climbing area of the house was designed to closely resemble the pandas' natural environment, and was coated with a special compound, because bear faeces corrodes concrete. The building complex also included a ticket office, a restaurant and a souvenir shop. Construction on the panda house was not complete until a week before the arrival of the pandas.
The building cost 8.2 million euros. The investment was paid for by Ähtärin Eläinpuisto Oy. Ähtäri city tried to grant it first eight million and then ten million euro loan guarantees, but the overturned the city council's decisions.
After travelling from Dujiangyan Panda Center, the pandas flew from Chengdu Shuangliu International Airport and arrived at Helsinki Airport on 18 January 2018. After being quarantined for a month, male Hua Bao and female Jin Baobao could first be seen by the public on 17 February.

Time in Finland

It was hoped that the pandas would bring 100,000 more visitors to Ähtäri every year. This would mean an additional annual income of around six million euros for companies in the region. A total of 275,000 visitors visited the zoo in 2018. The number was close to the target, which was 280,000 visitors. The revenue doubled compared to the previous year, rising to eleven million euros. The zoo achieved a profit of 1.2 million euros, but the following year, Ähtäri Zoo companies made a loss of about one million euros and had to reduce their operations by a dismissal or part-time employment of a maximum of 20 people of their 50 employees.
The starting point of the project was for the two pandas to have a cub. In July 2022, Lumi had still not produced the expected cub. Two out of three mating attempts ended in false pregnancy, and the third attempt at artificial insemination also ended in disappointment.
The Finnish Parliament assisted Ähtäri Zoo with 1.5 million, and an additional budget of three million euros was presented at the beginning of 2023, before plans were made to return the pandas.
In 2023, the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry proposed a support of up to five million euros for the zoo, which was approved in the supplemental budget proposal by the Ministry of Finance, led by centrist Finance Minister Annika Saarikko. When the proposal aroused widespread criticism, the Minister of Agriculture and Forestry Antti Kurvinen withdrew his proposal.

Issues and return to China

No insurance company agreed to insure the pandas, so the Finnish government promised to pay China two million euros in compensation if the pandas died during the flight.
The pandas were leased to Ähtäri with a 15-year contract. Over the course of 15 years, they would have cost Ähtäri a total of around 14 million euros. An adult panda eats about 12 kilograms of bamboo every day, which means costs of about 100,000 euros per year. Ähtäri Zoo ordered bamboo from a Dutch greenhouse, although a project was underway to cultivate bamboo suitable for pandas in Ähtäri.
Part of the reasons for a decrease in the number of visitors have been, for example, the COVID-19 pandemic and the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
On 27 January 2023, Ähtäri Zoo announced its intention to return the pandas to China. However, these plans became difficult in terms of foreign and trade policy, and in addition, the transportation costs would be high if the pandas were eventually returned. In September 2024, it was announced that the pandas would be returned at the end of the year. They could last be seen by the public on 21 October.