Company: CRL
Filing Date: 2025-04-02
Form Type: DEF 14A
Source: 0001104659-25-030908
Chunk: 112

Company: CHARLES RIVER LABORATORIES INTERNATIONAL, INC.
Filing Date: 2025-04-02
Form: DEF 14A
Chunk 112
---
 Board of Directors established a new Responsible Animal Use Committee to oversee our NHP importation practices and review, evaluate and advise the Board and management regarding the continued enhancement of responsible animal utilization, including NHPs, which may appropriately reduce the impact of animals in the Company’s operations. Innovation is a core focus for Charles River, and we offer alternatives to animal testing whenever possible. We also partner with clients to develop study designs that decrease the number of animals needed and suggest pilot studies where necessary. Implementation of the 3Rs is reinforced by the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee (IACUC), Ethics Committee (EC) and Animal Welfare Body (AWB) at all of our facilities around the globe. The IACUC, EC and AWB are responsible for oversight of the facilities’ animal care and use program, for promoting refinements and ensuring animal well-being, and for assuring compliance with all applicable laws and regulations related to animal care and use. We are actively working to replace, reduce, and refine the use of animals in drug development and to create new technologies to eliminate the use of animals altogether, and we support efforts by Congress, the FDA and the broader research community in these areas. However, we recognize that new drug testing technologies to realize this vision at a broad scale are still many years away. NHPs therefore remain essential to support the development of the thousands drug products currently in preclinical development. Scientific excellence, humane care, maintenance of high-quality standards, and ethical and accountable supply chains, are cornerstones of the Charles River culture. NHPs, free of disease and infection, are the most scientifically relevant large models for critical translational research for biologic drugs. At this time, NHPs remain essential to support our clients’ focus on expanding their biologic drug pipelines as they work to develop innovative treatments for a wide range of diseases. As we move forward, we will continue to work to r eplace, r educe, r efine and promote the responsible use of animals in drug development and to create new technologies with an objective to eliminate the need to rely upon animals altogether. We wish to correct a misleading reference in the shareholder proponent’s supporting statement; specifically, Macaca fascicularis (long-tailed macaque) are not considered to be an endangered species. In fact, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service explicitly rejected the proponent’s petition to list the animals under the Endangered Species Act in October 2024, and pursuant to the international agreement between governments overseeing trade in specimens of