Siberian tiger cubs are seen at the Dalian Forest Zoo in Dalian, Liaoning province February 7, 2010. Credit: Reuters/Jacky Chen

BEIJING (Reuters) – China has an estimated 50 or fewer tigers left living in the wild, but efforts to stabilize one population in the bleak northeast are starting to pay off, a conservationist said on Monday.

 

Tigers once roamed huge swathes of China, right up to the now booming east coast. Their population has collapsed due to habitat destruction on the back of rapid economic development and poaching for tiger products to use in traditional medicine.

About 10 still live in the southwestern province of Yunnan, some 15 in Tibet, and 20 or so in northwestern Jilin and Heilongjiang provinces, said Xie Yan, China Country Program Director of the Wildlife Conservation Society.

The South China Tiger is probably already extinct, she told the Foreign Correspondents Club of China, ahead of the Chinese Lunar New Year of the Tiger, which starts on Sunday.

"The number of wild tigers left in China is very depressing," Xie said. "We have less than 50 individuals in the wild. The populations in Tibet and in the south are still dropping.

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