The giant panda found only in China has been removed from the endangered species list by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) based in Switzerland, a move not supported by the Chinese government.
IUCN now classifies the giant panda (Ailuropoda melanoleuca) as "vulnerable" and not "endangered," thanks mostly to China's conservation efforts over the past decades. China's giant panda survey in 2015 said giant panda numbers increased 17 percent in the past decade.
There were1,864 adults living in the wild as of 2014 from 1,596 in 2004. Adding giant panda cubs to that number brings the total population to some 2,060 individuals.
IUCN said the jump in population was the result of work by Chinese agencies that enforced poaching bans and expand forest reserves.
"Evidence from a series of range-wide national surveys indicate that the previous population decline has been arrested, and the population has started to increase," reported IUCN on its website.
"An increase in available habitat and an expanding occupied range provide further support for the contention that Panda numbers are increasing. Forest protection and reforestation measures have increased forest cover in China (FAO 2010), and have supported an 11.8% increase in occupied habitat and 6.3% increase in unoccupied but suitable habitat between the Third and Fourth National Surveys (State Forestry Administration 2015)."
IUCN said a survey of expert opinion among Giant Panda experts in the IUCN Bear Specialist Group "was consistent with the results of the national survey: all believed that the Panda population was stable or increasing and that available habitat was increasing."
IUCN warned, however, that climate change might eliminate more than 35 percent of the panda's natural bamboo habitat over the next 80 years, potentially leading to another decline.
The State Forestry Administration of China told media it disputed the classification change to vulnerable because the pandas' natural habitats have been fragmented by natural and human causes. It said panda's live in small, isolated groups consisting of as few as 10 pandas that struggle to reproduce and face the risk of disappearing altogether.
"If we downgrade their conservation status, or neglect or relax our conservation work, the populations and habitats of giant pandas could still suffer irreversible loss and our achievements would be quickly lost," said the forestry administration.
"Therefore, we're not being alarmist by continuing to emphasize the panda species' endangered status."