South Africa announced Thursday that it had reached an agreement to transfer more than 100 cheetahs to India, as part of an ambitious project to reintroduce the spotted cat to the country.

South Africa’s environment ministry has announced that the first batch of 12 cheetahs will be flown to India next month, joining eight others imported from Namibia last September.

“The plan is to transfer twelve more annually over the next 8 to 10 years” to help maintain “a viable and safe cheetah population there,” the ministry said in a statement.

India was once home to the Asian cheetah, a subspecies that was declared extinct in 1952, due to a lack of suitable habitat and because they were hunted by poachers for their spotted skin.

Efforts to reintroduce the cheetah, the world’s fastest land animal, gained momentum in 2020 when India’s Supreme Court gave the go-ahead to import the African cheetah, a distinct subspecies, “into carefully selected sites” and on an experimental basis.

Negotiations for this agreement with South Africa dragged on for a long time, and initially reserved for the arrival of the first cheetahs last August, who had been waiting in quarantine.

“The cheetahs are still doing well,” said Adrian Tordiffe, a wildlife veterinarian at the University of Pretoria, who is involved in the project.

According to the authorities, the previous transfer of cheetahs from Namibia to India was the first cheetah relocation from one continent to another.

This cheetah was released in the Ancient National Park, 320 km south of New Delhi, which is known for its abundant prey and pasture.