We're often told that universities and public institutions operate independently of corporate influence. Yet the animal agriculture industrial complex – a coordinated network of companies, lobby groups, PR firms, and aligned institutions – actively shapes what is researched, funded, taught, and believed about climate, health, and animal welfare. Research has shown how livestock interests embed themselves in universities through funding streams and credibility-building, helping obstruct evidence-based climate understanding and policy.

This talk traces three intersecting pathways of capture. First, it examines how industry influence enters climate research through professional incentives and "mentorship" structures that steer early-career researchers toward industry-beneficial questions while marginalising structural solutions (including reducing livestock numbers). Second, it highlights how public money is used to market meat and dairy as "sustainable," normalising harmful systems through taxpayer-funded messaging. Third, it explores how "regenerative" cattle narratives and selective carbon accounting are mobilised to greenwash deforestation, methane, and extractive profit-making while presenting livestock as a climate solution.

For activists, the key lesson is strategic: we are not only confronting harmful practices, but a knowledge-production regime designed to legitimise exploitation and discredit alternatives. Exposing these mechanisms is essential for countering misinformation, challenging institutional complicity, and building effective strategies for systemic change.