International Day for Animals in Laboratoires

77,000 monkeys exported from Mauritius over the last decade

Monkey Massacre in Mauritius, in collaboration with the Spanish organisation Abolición Vivisección, had exposed the activities of Camarney on International Day for Animals in Laboratoires 2023; prior to which the Mauritian population had been under the false impression that long-tailed macaques exported from Mauritius ended up exclusively in medical laboratories.

Situated in Camarles, Spain, Camarney is not the only breeding/retention facility for long-tailed macaques from Mauritius outside the country’s territories, from which long-tailed macaques are traded across Europe and the USA, misleadingly branded as ‘products from Mauritius’; another example of such retention/breeding farm being BC FL LLC, found in Florida, belonging to Bioculture.

The pertinent question which we have been raising, yet remains unanswered as at date, is: What are the financial benefits for our country when monkeys are being sent from the breeding facilities in Mauritius to their own branches in other countries?

Moreover, several NHP (non-human primates) breeding facilities exist across the US, UK and Europe, to which the Mauritian monkey farms supply monkeys for reproduction, mainly wild-caught (F0), since in-bred (F1) monkeys have low rates of reproduction due to stress and lack of physical activity leading to health issues such as high levels of cholesterol and diabetes. (Ref: https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld200809/ldselect/ldeucom/164/164we10.htm).

For this reason, it is unlikely that export of monkeys from Mauritius will come to an end with the government’s proposed plan to promote widescale Animal Testing in Mauritius; yet another misinformation.

The breeding/retention facilities outside Mauritius will continue to be supplied with reproductive monkeys, even if Charles River Labs and/or other contract testing labs start testing massively on monkeys in Mauritius so as to reduce their freight costs and double up their profits.

May we remind you of the contract awarded by the French government-funded research facility CNRS (Centre National de Recherche Scientifique) to Les Campèches, situated in the National Park, last year; for the supply of 500 reproductive females at Rs500 million.

This year, in the context of International Day for Animals in Laboratoires, Monkey Massacre in Mauritius and the French organisation One Voice, are backing up Abolición Vivisección to disseminate the images below so as to raise awareness on the plight of Mauritian monkeys at Camarney and on the fact that some procedures are carried out on monkeys within breeding facilities. This also applies to some of the monkey farms in Mauritius, yet remains unaccounted for.

Of the 77,000 monkeys exported from Mauritius over the last decade, 30,000 have had Camarney as destination. Overall, it is estimated that Mauritius has exported 182,000 long-tailed macaques as at date, not only for pre-clinical trials, toxicology testing and scientific experiments but also for breeding outside Mauritius.