Kerala Agricultural University was established in the year 1971 by the Act 33 of 1971 of the Kerala State Legislature. It started functioning from the next year with existing two educational and 21 research institutions in order to promote education in Agriculture, Horticulture, Animal Husbandry Including Veterinary And Dairy Science, Co-Operation, Fisheries, Forestry, Agricultural Engineering, Home Science. Previously these institutions were under Departments of Agriculture and Animal Husbandry of the Government of Kerala.The University is located at Vellanikkara in the Thrissur District of Kerala. The Governor of Kerala serves as the Chancellor and the Minister for Agriculture serves as the Pro-Chancellor of the University.

There are 36 campuses of the University across the state. The University has also ten affiliated colleges, six Regional Agricultural Research Stations, 26 Research Stations, three Centres of Advanced Studies, the Central Training Institute, seven Krishi Vigyan Kendras the Communication Centre, the KAU Press and the Central Library. Over the years the University arranges several research programmes. The university provides high quality research equipments to the researchers. The University contains Dairy Plant, Meat Technology & Carcass Utilization Plant, Radiotracer Laboratory, Electron Microscopy, Geographic Information System Center, Central Computer Facility, and Electron Microscopy to support sophisticated research.