With its efforts to both address basic scientific questions and meet national and public demands in the field of biodiversity usage and conservation biology, evolutionary heredity and development, animal models and human disease, the Institute places great importance on international communication and cooperation, establishing long-term, stable and strategic cooperation partnerships with renowned international universities and institutes. This includes establishing joint-laboratories, attracting full time foreign scientists, hosting international conferences, building international iBOL committee, arranging exchange visits of research staff, joint-training of graduate students, and scientific research cooperation. The Institute also proposes, applies for and undertakes international cooperation projects. Scientists at the Institute are recommended for positions in international academic organization, thus improving the international academic standing of KIZ.

Cooperation with international groups is an inevitable demand for realizing an institute’s research objectives. Since the induction of the CAS Knowledge Innovation Program, international cooperation has developed significantly at the KIZ. Due to the abundant biodiversity in Southwest China and Southeast Asia, and the impacts of developmental needs at the national and provincial level, KIZ is involved in substantial collaboration with foreign organizations through hosting important international symposiums, establishing joint laboratories, conducting cooperative postgraduate training projects, and attracting highly skilled scholars from abroad.

In recent years, KIZ has established collaborations with research institutions in the United States, Germany, Britain, France, Russia, Japan, India, Vietnam and other countries. KIZ has held 2 “Sino-German Symposium on Complex Biology System”, 3 International Symposium on NHP in Basic Biomedical Research, and The 4th Symposium on Neuroscience for Scholars Worldwide. The institute has also set up 2 Max-Planck Junior Scientist Groups, a Sino-UK Ecology, Conservation, and Environment Center, an office of International Barcode of Life Project (iBOL) Central Node – China; and completed both the GEF/WB Dianchi Fresh Water Biodiversity Conservation Project and an ecological survey in north of Myanmar.