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The Dirty Business of Monkey Laundering
Cambodia is the largest exporter of illegal wild baby monkeys to the United States. Since 2014 over 30,000 baby monkeys were laundered annually from Cambodia to the United States. Each baby monkey, mainly 1kg to 3kg baby macaques at a cost of $30,000 to $50,000 each. Baby monkeys were used at research labs, pharmaceutical companies, colleges and universities, and private and government backed hospitals.
Fake permits, undercover informants and millions of dollars. How a US government agency set out to prove suppliers to research labs were importing wild monkeys from Cambodia with false paperwork.
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The Dirty Business of Monkey Laundering: Uncovering the Illegal Trade of Baby Monkeys from Cambodia
The global wildlife trade has a dark, multi-million dollar counterpart; the smuggling of infant monkeys, more specifically long-tailed macaques, from Cambodia to research centers in the U.S. “Monkey laundering” refers to wild-caught monkeys being passed off as captive-bred primates to hide circumvention of international law. Eventually, Cambodia would become the primary supplier for these monkeys, exporting over thirty thousand baby macaques annually to the United States, each selling between thirty and fifty thousand dollars. Now, often weighing 1-3 kilograms, these are resold to pharmaceutical companies, universities, and government-funded hospitals. This blog explores the monkey soothing phenomenon that cover-up attempts have tried to expose, such as false documentation, the workings of the illegal trade, and the people behind it all, due to the Bloomberg Investigates and GCA News Forum Investigates documentaries.
The Extent of the Business
Cambodia’s place in the world servicing monkey laundering has increased in importance with the global surge in their use for biomedical research. Long-tailed macaques, which are extensively used in experiments from vaccine development to toxicity testing, are prized for their genetic resemblance to humans. Reports suggest Cambodia exported over 13,000 macaques in 2023 alone, including to the US, Japan, Canada, and China. The US, however, is the largest importer, and it has been estimated to receive 30,000 baby macaques yearly since 2014. Fuelled by hundreds of breeders, exporters, and intermediaries, the trade is worth hundreds of millions of dollars annually, costing 30,000 to 50,000 per monkey.
Illegal practices have increased because of the high value placed on these primates. These monkeys pose a great risk to wildlife as they are often poached from protected areas, such as the Prey Lang Wildlife Sanctuary. These monkeys are much cheaper than the ones bred in captivity. Traffickers can circumvent international laws by calling those bred in private facilities wild monkeys and passing them off as captive-bred monkeys.
**How Monkey Laundering Works**
Monkey laundering relies on deceit and misconduct, often involving the following steps:
Poaching from the Wild: Young macaques are seized from their natural environments, frequently from national parks or wildlife sanctuaries. This not only damages the population in the wild but also places immense psychological strain on infant monkeys due to the overwhelming stress and high mortality rates associated with capture and transport.
Falsified Documentation: To meet CITES compliance requirements, which limit trade for endangered species captured from the wild, traffickers create permits and health certificates. These documents erroneously state that the monkeys were born in licensed breeding facilities such as Vanny Bio Cambodia.
Breeding Facility Facade: Vanny Bio, one of Cambodia’s largest exporters, was implicated in laundering wild monkeys. It has been documented that their reported births at these facilities, at times in the thousands of monkeys per year, exceed biologically plausible limits, demonstrating the mixing of captured animals into the supply chain.
Export to the U.S.: After being “legalized” with false paperwork, the monkeys await shipment to research facilities in the U.S., including major clients like Charles River Laboratories, a $12.5 billion pharmaceutical testing company. These facilities claim they are unaware of the monkeys’ origin, with the certificates of the CITES permits stating the monkeys’ births.
Baby macaques are subjects of various experiments, from drug testing to brain research. During the COVID-19 pandemic, a surge in demand from vaccine research fueled the trade further.
The Role of False Paperwork and Corruption
Money laundering relies heavily on false documentation, and CITES regulations state that exported primates must have verification papers confirming they were bred in captivity. However, investigations show widespread fraud in Cambodia involving issuing these permits. Between 2017 and 2022, the US Fish and Wildlife Service investigated a cavity spanning Cambodia to the USA. They brought indictments against eight persons internally, including a high-ranking official from Cambodia’s forestry administration. Both were accused of issuing fake permits to facilitate trade.
Another example involves Kry Masphal, the former deputy director of Cambodia’s wildlife and biodiversity unit in 2022. He was arrested for trying to get away with vouchers for wild monkey shipments from Vanny Bio. Although he managed to evade serious prosecution later, enough stored evidence showed government officials accepting bribes for overlooking honesty and a poaching attempt.
U.S. Attempt to Stop the Trade
The USFWS leads the attempts to break apart monkey laundering syndicates. With the help of undercover informants and their global contacts, the agency discovered portions of wild monkeys being traded under the captive breeding scheme. In one case, drone cameras captured clear-cutting within the known macaque-populated Prey Lang Wildlife Sanctuary, which indicated potential poaching tied to breeding facilities. Also, the USFWS raised concerns about farms in Cambodia, reporting strikingly high birth rates, which led CITES to propose a ban on exports of macaques in January 2025.
Still, some complications can be noted. The US case against Kry Masphal fell apart because of a too-limited investigation and controversial use of undercover techniques, leaving space for companies like Vanny Bio. Also, major US importers, including Charles River Laboratories, are increasingly scrutinized for their part in the trade. The company accepted being under investigation for employing Cambodian monkeys in 2023, but insists they don’t breach CITES rules.
Investigative Journalism and Public Concerns
Bloomberg Investigates and GCA Forums News Investigative Reports have showcased the intersection of documentarism and the monkey laundering trade. Bloomberg Investigates brought to light Cambodia’s disturbing breeding exports of primates, showing footage of overcrowded breeding prisons and captivity farms as well as interviews with whistleblowers. GCA Forums News Investigates the award-winning series that covered the USA Fish and Wildlife Service’s attempt at proving suppliers were committing permit violations of laws etched in evidence; the trade’s ethics and environmental impact were terrifying. These shows caution audiences about the troubling nature of their content, which includes persistent imagery of infant primates in paws and captures as well as accounts narrated by poachers and compelled animal abductors or hunters.
Everything we have investigated so far has led to outcry from citizens and repeatedly going their way to sign documents pushing for reforms. Groups that protect living beings, like PETA and Action for Primates, have used these documents to force the country’s government, as well as CITES, to pass more laws. In January 2025, Action For Primates lauded CITES for proposing the suspension, citing supporting USFWS’s investigation considering massive trafficking accusations of paperwork-based trafficking by the non-profit.
Environmental and Ethical Considerations
The illegal trade of baby macaques harms highly endangered species and wildlife ecosystems. Long-tailed macaques are classified as endangered, and poaching only worsens this. These primates are essential to ecosystems because they help in the dispersal of seeds and the regeneration of forests. Additionally, breeding facilities and research labs raise ethical concerns. During capture, transport, and experimentation, infant macaques suffer a form of significant grief, especially when they are removed from their mothers.
Furthermore, the international community strives to protect wildlife as a whole. International wildlife protections suffer greatly due to traffickers exploiting loopholes found in CITES. Authorities in Cambodia have resisted calls for a pause in trade, arguing that the U.S. misused data and infiltrated their sovereignty. However, critics like PETA’s Lisa Jones-Engel argue that continued exports of these animals only worsen the cycle of abuse and harm to the environment.
Future Perspectives and Global Reactions
The matter of addressing global money laundering is still under discussion. CITES, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, decided not to suspend the export of Cambodian macaques, moving instead to a stage of further review in February 2025. While this action had activists calling for more decisiveness, CITES action is critiqued as permitting further injustice toward monkeys that are fundamentally abused. At the same time, these Canadians faced mounting criticism for halting their imports to Cambodia after they had started purchasing these imports during America’s market withdrawal in 2022.
To mitigate this problem, experts suggest there is far greater enforcement of CITES regulations, more independent inspections of breeding facilities, and greater openness in the global supply chain of primates. Some technologies, like DNA testing to prove breeding in captivity, could help deter laundering. On the demand side, dependency and Primates need to be reduced through other means of research, such as simulations and human volunteers, to encourage more free-ranging monkeys.
Final Thoughts
The financially motivated and morally corrupt “monkey laundering” trade reveals the darker side of profit running parallel with corruption and exploitation of nature. Macaque’s illegal trafficking trade is widely operated in Cambodia, being the biggest exporter of baby macaques to the United States. This case, like many others, illustrates the difficulty in policing such a cunningly organized illegal trade. Accompanied investigative journalism and some efforts by the government have brought some attention to the, more often than not, overlooked issues. However, much more must be done to enable endangered primates to be properly shielded and ensure that universal conservation laws are followed. While phenomena such as “Bloomberg Investigates” and GCA Forums News Investigates strive to shed light on ethical issues connected with the means of progress in Monkey laundering, it helps nudge society to start taking action against our environment’s profit-driven destruction.
Like many issues, this one lacks attention from the media. Bloomberg Investigates and GCA Forums News Investigates cover a wider scope of the issue, so for further information, they are the ones to seek.