International Trade in Primates for Research
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Every year, tens of thousands of monkeys are traded globally for the international animal research industry. Some are trapped in the wild while others are bred in captivity, usually in factory farms type conditions.
Time and time again, our pioneering and hard-hitting investigations have exposed the brutality and misery inflicted on monkeys in the chain of supply from the trapping fields to the laboratory cage.
Since 2006 our investigators have travelled the world undertaking a number of daring missions in countries like Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, Peru and Mauritius. We have exposed the inherent cruelty and suffering inflicted on monkeys during their capture and confinement by infiltrating trapping networks and secretly filming inside monkey farms.
Tracks’ Executive Director Gemunu de Silva has been awarded the RSCPA Special Investigation Award for his investigative work on the international trade in primates.
The long-tailed macaque is the most heavily traded primate species and the most widely used by the global animal research industry. The conservation status of long-tailed macaques has just been changed from vulnerable to “endangered” for the first time by the International Union for Conservation of Nature due to unprecedented demand for these monkeys by animal researchers.
Our investigations revealed that the global demand for animal test subjects is driving an illegal and unimpeded cross-border trade in wild long-tailed macaques that is threatening to diminish the species survival in many countries.
Tracks Investigations has undertaken over 295 investigative film projects supporting over 40 conservation, environmental and animal protection NGOs since its inception in 2006. Learn more about how you can work with us here. To support our investigative work for animals, click here.