The Taipei City Zoo is considering reducing the daily quota for the number of visitors to allow each visitor more time to see two Chinese pandas, a newspaper reported Wednesday.
The zoo is mulling cutting the daily quota of visitors to the Panda House from 22,000 to 10,000 after receiving complaints that people were being rushed through the Panda House, giving each person less than a minute to see the pandas, the Taipei Times said.
"We will consider making changes after the Chinese New Year holidays, depending on the circumstances," the paper quoted Taipei Zoo Director Jason Yeh as saying, dpa reported.
The two pandas, named as Tuan Tuan and Yuan Yuan (Tuanyuan means Reunion in Chinese), were given by Chinese President Hu Jintao to Taiwan on December 23, 2008. Following month-long quarantine, they made their debut on Monday - the first day of the Chinese New Year holidays.
Currently the Taipei Zoo allows only 22,000 people to see the pandas each day, hoping each visitor can stay inside the Panda House for 10 minutes.
But because of the long lines, the visitors are rushed through the Panda House and some have even failed to see the pandas as they often walks around and hide behind the bamboo or wooden structures.
Some visitors said they felt cheated as they had driven several hours from south Taiwan to Taipei in order to see the pandas. But they either failed to see the pandas or were pushed out of the viewing area by security guards before they could take a photo of the charismatic megafauna.
Pandas are among the most-endangered species in the world. There are about 1,680 pandas in the world, and most of them live in the mountains in southwest China.
