Photo taken on Sept. 7, 2016 shows a giant panda in Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding in Chengdu, southwest China's Sichuan Province. A Chinese giant panda expert said on Tuesday that it is too early to downgrade the conservation status of the species after the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) took the species off its endangered list on Sunday. The IUCN said in a report that the panda is now classified as "vulnerable" instead of "endangered," reflecting growing numbers in the wild in southern China. The union attributed the increase in population to decades of dedicated conservation efforts in China. (Xinhua/Xue Yubin)
