WILDLIFE campaigners are angry at a plan by a Hong Kong company to set up one of the world's biggest monkey farms in Vietnam.
The creatures will be sold to pharmaceutical and medical research laboratories around the world where they will be used to test drugs and other products.
'It is terrible, terrible. There is no end to the ingenuity of man when it comes to making money and being cruel,' said Dr John Wedderburn, a former committee member of the RSPCA.
Vanny Chain Technology has set up a US$2 million (HK$15.45 million) joint venture company, Nafofanny, with a division of Vietnam's Forestry Ministry to create a network of monkey farms throughout southern Vietnam.
The largest will be about 40 kilometres from Ho Chi Minh City in Dong Nai province.
A director of Vanny Chain Technology, Daniel Chen, was unrepentant about the outrage the firm's farm plan would cause.