China's Lab Monkey Prices Nearly Double to $26,000 as Drug Research Surges
China's lab monkey prices nearly doubled to 178,000 yuan as drug development demand surges. The shortage is delaying preclinical studies, and the annual shortfall could reach 20,000 monkeys.
Prices for laboratory monkeys in China have nearly doubled over the past year, with a state lab paying 178,000 yuan (US$26,294) per cynomolgus monkey in June. The surge is being driven by an explosion in demand from China's drug development industry, which now accounts for roughly a third of the world's innovative drug pipeline and is the leading site for clinical trials.
Prices have climbed from 100,000 yuan to 200,000 yuan per monkey, and from 70,500 yuan in 2021 to around 140,000 yuan more recently. A bid notice from the Shanghai Institute of Materia Medica set a budget of 62 million yuan for 450 crab-eating macaques, about 137,800 yuan each — exceeding the average annual salary of 102,452 yuan for employees at large Chinese companies. The cost of a single monkey could exceed 200,000 yuan next year, depending on quantity needed, urgency, and vendor.
The demand is fueled by advanced bio-research fields such as antibodies, antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs), and radiopharmaceuticals. For ADC candidates, 70 to 100 monkeys are needed for preclinical safety studies, while relatively simple drugs with lower toxicity risks require around 40 to 60 monkeys per project. Some small-molecule drugs can use dogs instead of monkeys.
Last year, the number of clinical trials in China exceeded 5,000, an 18% increase from the previous year, with more than 70% requiring experiments using cynomolgus or rhesus monkeys. In the first half of this year, about 1,296 new clinical trials for novel drugs were registered, a 36% increase year over year. Chinese pharmaceutical companies signed a record 157 technology transfer deals with global drugmakers last year, worth a total of 135.7 billion dollars.
China produces approximately 30,000 monkeys annually, far short of demand. One securities projection estimates an annual shortage of 15,000 to 20,000 monkeys between 2026 and 2028; another projects annual supply of 49,000 to 52,400 animals and demand of 51,300 to 62,600 for 2025-2027. Some breeding farms have already booked out their output through the first quarter of this year. Imports from Cambodia, which resumed in 2026 after a pandemic-related hiatus, are expected to help alleviate the shortage.
The supply crunch is delaying study timelines: the planning phase for studies can extend by four months, and in some cases up to 10 months. Because Chinese regulators require monkeys used in toxicology testing to be at least three years old, bottlenecks cannot be quickly fixed. Large contract research organizations, including WuXi AppTec, Pharmaron Beijing, and Joinn Laboratories, have established their own breeding farms to secure access. Joinn, which owns more than 50,000 monkeys, posted a net profit exceeding 700 million yuan, and its stock price more than doubled from 27 yuan in March to 55.68 yuan recently.
The demand is not confined to China. In the US, approximately 60,000 monkeys are used annually in research, with some selling for over US$50,000 as recently as 2024. France's National Centre for Scientific Research is expanding breeding capacity as costs reach 30,000 euros (US$34,595) each. Private Chinese biotechs raised over US$3.49 billion in the first half of 2026, surpassing the total for all of 2025, indicating continued investment in new drug development and sustained pressure on monkey supply.