Authorities at a Thai zoo have put a male Panda on a low-carb diet regime to get him to

mate. Officials at the Chiang Mai Zoo in northern Thailand say that Chuang Chuang the Panda is too heavy to have sex and needs to lose weight to persuade his female counterpart to have sex.

"Chuang Chuang is gaining weight too fast and we found Lin Hui is no longer comfortable with having sex with him," Kanika Limtrakul, the chief veterinarian at the zoo told the AP, adding that Chuang Chuang weighed 331 pounds while Lin Hui is only 253 pounds.

The recent diet campaign comes after a series of failed efforts by the zoo to get Chuang Chuang to mate with his female partner, Lin Hui.

To get the pair in the mood the zoo officials had even held a mock wedding, announced plans to separate the two to spark a little romance and said they were going to show them "panda porn'' videos to coach them in mating techniques.

The desperation of zoo authorities to get the two bears to mate stems from the expectation that the rare animals could generate millions of dollars in revenues from Thai and foreign tourists.