The "Big Man" and "Double Smoothness" - otherwise known as the giant pandas Da Mao and Er Shun - finally arrived in Toronto, ending more than a 20-year wait by Canadians to again see the cuddly bears.

The Federal Express plane carrying the pair touched down at Toronto Pearson International Airport on Monday morning. Prime Minister Stephen Harper, his wife Laureen and Chinese Ambassador to Canada Zhang Junsai were on hand for their arrival.

"Their presence in Canada today and the next 10 years will remind us of the strong relationship between the two countries," said Harper, who announced on his visit to China early last year that the Chinese government had agreed to loan the pandas.

"I'm pretty sure that Er Shun and Da Mao will live happily here," said Junsai. "And I also hope that they will soon produce some junior kung-fu pandas."

The pandas arrived after more than a 15-hour, 12,875-kilometer journey from Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan province. They were provided with plenty of bamboo, bamboo shoots and apples. Veterinarians from the Chengdu panda base and the Chongqing and Toronto zoos traveled with them. Visitors to the Toronto Zoo will be able to see the two pandas after a month-long quarantine.

Da Mao is a 4-year-old male from the Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding in Sichuan. His prospective mating partner Er Shun is a 5-year-old female from Chongqing Zoo. They will spend five years at Toronto Zoo followed by another five years at the Calgary Zoo.

Zoo officials are hoping the pandas, who have never been together before, will be more than friendly toward one another and produce offspring. There is only one 48-to-72 hour window a year when a female panda can get pregnant.

If Er Shun gives birth, the offspring must be returned to China after the loan with a $200,000 charge. Rent on the pandas to China costs $1 million a year.

The use of the pandas as China's diplomats isn't new. Panda diplomacy dates back to the Tang Dynasty, when Empress Wu Zetian (AD 625-705) sent a pair to the Japanese emperor as a goodwill gesture.

"The program will allow the Toronto and Calgary zoos to contribute to ongoing international efforts to increase the population of endangered giant pandas. Currently, fewer than 2,000 pandas remain in the wild," said Zhang Zhihe, chief of the Chengdu panda base.

The zoos at Toronto, Calgary and Winnipeg hosted Chinese pandas for short-term stays on three occasions in the 1980s.

"Qing Qing and Quan Quan's 100-day stay in Toronto in 1985 drew hundreds of thousands of visitors," Zhang said. "On the first two days, there were 35,000."

The closest zoos to Toronto that have pandas are in Washington and Memphis, Tennessee.

Li Mingxi, a panda expert from the Chengdu base, said he will stay in Canada for six months to help Da Mao adapt to his new environment.

"Initially, we had arranged for Ji Li, a female panda, to head to Canada because the Chengdu panda base had been asked to supply a female, and Chongqing Zoo to provide a male. But because Chongqing Zoo had mistaken Er Shun for a male and discovered her gender very late, we had to let Da Mao take the place of Ji Li," Zhang said.

With younger pandas it is more difficult to determine their sex and this is confirmed through genetic testing techniques, said William Rapley, Toronto Zoo's executive director of conservation, education and wildlife.

"We did not find she was a female until an all-round examination in late November," said Tang Jiagui, a panda expert at the Chongqing Zoo.

Oliver Claffey was one of the keepers who looked after the pandas in Toronto in 1985. He thinks this visit will be even more successful than the first one because the pandas will be in the zoo for five years.

"I suspect that with the knowledge and staff we have at Toronto Zoo, the pandas will breed and that's the idea," he told the Canadian Broadcasting Corp.

renali@chinadailyusa.com