PETA to Feds: Give Imperiled Macaques Endangered Species Act Protection Now!

Organizations Around the Globe Join PETA’s Plea for U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service to Extend Protections to Two Endangered Monkey Species

For Immediate Release:
April 12, 2023

Contact:
Tasgola Bruner 202-483-7382

PETA, prominent primate scientists including Jane Goodall and Birutė Galdikas, and more than 30 wildlife and scientific organizations from around the world with decades of expertise in the wildlife trade, monkey ecology, and conservation are calling for the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service (FWS) to grant protections under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) to two species of monkeys before they’re wiped off the planet by the insatiable animal experimentation industry.

Today, PETA filed two formal petitions for rulemaking with the FWS (here and here), making the case that the agency must act immediately to add long-tailed and southern pig-tailed macaques to the list of species protected by the ESA. Under current rules, ESA protections can be granted to species who face just one threatening factor. Long-tailed and southern pig-tailed macaques face at least four, including overuse for scientific purposes. With certain exceptions, the ESA makes it illegal to import, export, take, possess, sell, or transport any endangered or threatened species. The FWS has 90 days to decide whether the petitions are warranted.

“The U.S. animal experimentation industry’s voracious demand has nearly emptied the forests of these keystone species,” says PETA primate scientist Dr. Lisa Jones-Engel. “PETA urges the FWS to step up and protect these primates before we lose them completely.”

In July 2022, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) added the two monkey species to its Red List of Threatened Species, placing them among the most endangered species on the planet. The IUCN cited the animal experimentation industry as one of the chief reasons for the depletion of long-tailed macaques worldwide.

If nothing is done to save these two species, the IUCN projects that their wild populations will decline by as much as 50% over the next three generations of monkeys.

The long-tailed macaque is a favorite among U.S. animal experimentation laboratories. Both species face additional challenges from habitat destruction, and both are captured in staggering numbers and funneled into the international wildlife trade, where they end up in U.S. laboratories for pointless, painful, and deadly experiments.

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to experiment on”—opposes speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview. For more information, please visit PETA.org, listen to The PETA Podcast, or follow the group on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram.