The British Industrial Biological Research Association (BIBRA) in Carshalton, Surrey is one of a few contract research laboratories in the country that test pharmaceuticals, agrochemicals and household products on animals.

Now as new areas of research such as genetic manipulation are expanding, the immunotoxicology department is working on safety tests for transgenic food crops such a tomatoes (already on supermarket shelves), in brown rats.

The project is funded by MAFF. BIBRA have and still do work with a list of companies that reads like a who's who of big business.

The list includes such favourites as ICI, Ciba-Geigy (now Novartis), SmithKline Beecham, Zeneca, Nestle, Exxon, Wellcome, Unilever and Proctor and Gamble.

August 30th saw a demonstration outside BIBRA with over 150 people showing up to find an enormous police presence, including twenty riot vans, horses and dogs.

BIBRA had also boarded up all their ground floor windows, installed temporary fencing around the huge site and had employed private security to patrol the grounds and the roof of the building.