> Almost all cows are fed with monocultured crops

Then there is grass fed cattle.

> and the amount of crops used to feed the animals is an order of magnitude more calories than if you just ate the crops directly.

Cows naturally eat grass, cows convert grass into protein and fat that humans can consume. Humans can’t consume grass directly.

Grassfed livestock uses 15-20 times more land than CAFOs at an estimate of 91.9 million heads (us stock as of jan 2022 according to USDA census) you’ll quickly realize that meat consumption at current rates its impossible.

Total land usage isn’t the only consideration, in fact it’s probably the most immaterial.

Cattle grazing on open grass lands is generally healthy for the land, the cattle and the end consumer. It’s actually a great trade off to destroying land with monocrop agriculture used to fatten up cattle which makes them sick and contributes to chronic conditions/metabolic diseases of the end consumers.

> Total land usage isn’t the only consideration, in fact it’s probably the most immaterial.

I don’t want to sound insulting but I don’t think you thought very well what it means to grow 91 million heads of cattle on grass alone, remember grass takes time to grow and it doesn’t do it during winter.

There are about 30M beef cattle and 10M dairy cattle.

The US once supported as many as 75M Buffalo, I don’t want to sound insulting but any guesses what they ate?

Not if you farm Joel Salatin style. He has a great sustainable system.

No, but we can consume crops grown with the land, water and fertilizer used to grow grass.

Just switching to chicken from red meat drops that resource usage by a factor of TEN.

Growing cattle for food is incredibly wasteful.

> Then there is grass fed cattle.

Sure. Which is significantly more expensive. If only grass fed beef was available, beef consumption would automatically decrease.