CRI听力:Panda: Envoys Strengthening Sino-European Relations

You can tell they are big shots, because wherever they go, they receive the kind of welcome usually reserved for celebrities.

This is the giant panda, a unique animal that can only be found in China.

However, due to their rarity, only a dozen overseas zoos own these widely popular animals.

Pairi Daiza Zoo in Belgium is the latest one to receive these wonderful creatures.

According to Michel Malherbe, Belgian Ambassador to China, the largest Chinese garden built inside the zoo and the friendship of the two nations helped the zoo win the application to loan pandas.

"When they asked whether they could receive giant panda from China, the Chinese side reacted very positively, and also in a very quick manner. So on the one hand, there was perfect infrastructure; and then on another hand, there was the quality of the bilateral relationship between Belgium and China. "

In 2012, Belgium's Prime Minister Di Rupo presented the request to Chinese premier Li Keqiang.

One year later, a 15-year loan agreement was signed.

In February of 2014, when Xing Hui and Hao Hao, a pair of 4-year-old pandas flew all the way to Belgium, they received a royal welcome from the Prime Minister and the public.

In order to welcome the guests, a 6,500 square meter panda venue was built inside the zoo's classic Chinese garden, which cost around 8 million euros.

Malberbe says the preparations are extensive.

"You know pandas only eat specific type of bamboo, so that was not easy to ensure sufficient supply of the necessary food in Belgium. A lot of cares were also given to the way they interact with the public, since these animals are quite shy. So you have to, as the zoo, to find the way to make them visible to the public with cameras and a lot of complicated arrangements. "

Britain has an affinity with pandas dating back to the 1930s. Over 70 years, 14 pandas have visited or lived on the British Isles. Yang Guang and Tian Tian are the current two tenants residing in Edinburgh Zoo.

According to Iain Valentine, director of the zoo's giant panda program, at the end of 2013, the number of people visiting panda house alone has reached a staggering one million.

Using pandas as a starting point, Valentine and his colleagues aim to strengthen the cultural and educational links between China and Britain.

"So what you do, is you use giant panda as the start of a story, and with giant pandas, you can get school children get interested in Chinese culture, the language, the history of China. And also, we use giant pandas to talk about trade, about how important China is to the world, and its impact on countries, and the economy of China, and the link already exist between UK and China. "

Since Belgium is China's sixth-largest trading partner among 28 European Union member countries, while China remains Belgium's second-largest trading partner outside the EU; Ambassador Malherbe says the pandas serve as the symbol of this flourishing relation.

"China-Belgium relation and the relation between China and Europe as a whole depend on people. We are talking about business, investment, universities, people-to-people contact. That is the reality. But everybody enjoys, when the symbols can represent the human relation."

For CRI, this is Liu Yan.