The Business of Pandas

• A female panda has only ~1 baby per year as they only ovulate a couple times a year. When you put them in a zoo it's even harder for them to reproduce because there are less partners to attract than in the wild -  thus the Pandas are hard to breed in captivity.

• Some skeptics who question whether decades of research and hundreds of millions of dollars are worth it to try to save a species with a population that still sits at fewer than 2,000. It raises the question: Were the last four decades and mountains of cash worth it for a few thousand bears?

• China owns every panda around the world - a profitable business for them.

• Zoos outside of China are only able to lease pandas - panda pairs can go for as much as $1 million per year plus a one-time fee per cub born of about $200,000 

• Cubs have to be sent back to China once they turn 4

• The panda attracts more direct conservation dollars than almost any other endangered species

 - Summarized from Motherboard