RE: Nearly half of the world’s habitable land is used for agriculture - livestock takes ~80% for just 17 to 18% of calories [Infographic]

The concerns you raise are why I so constantly advocate adopting aquaculture. Transforming private residences into gardens replete with fountains, in which suitable edible species like crawdads, catfish, and tilapia, are raised to harvest, and fertilize crops in the gardens while growing, could eliminate the need for commercial agriculture of all but very large animal species. Although there may be people in India that already share their homes with cows. Cows do live in close proximity to people there. Maybe arable land no longer needed for intensive agriculture after populations adopt aquaponics wholesale might be employed as range/wild land for cattle herds that won't fit in a standard living room.

The biggest problems with agriculture is it's elimination of natural habitat, chemical toxicity, and sucking up all the nutrient capital natural ecosystems have accumulated. Those problems can be not only eliminated, but replaced by net contributions to ecosystem health, and extend biodiversity, as folks adopt aquaponics to their personal circumstances. Not everyone has to grow corn and tomatoes, or in greenhouses, and plants don't have to grow in rows to be edible. Some folks might prefer exotic fruits, like guava, that ship poorly and so aren't often available outside of the tropics, and mixed plantings can certainly present aesthetic miens when comprised of edible crop species. Nasturtiums are both amongst my favorite flowers for the garden, and my favorite salad herbs, highly desirable for their peppery flavor.

I have just planted my new greenhouse, and am preparing to convert it over to aquaponics, so it isn't a theory that we can grow our food. It is something I am doing where I live. I am not a rocket scientist. If I can do it, almost anyone can.

Thanks!

Edit: I don't think I made this point clearly enough. Large animals are critical parts of natural ecosystems, not only of agriculture. While individual aquaponics systems might not be suitable for large animal husbandry, former agricultural land - where such large herbivores have been displaced from, generally - could extend the nutritional basis of communities, and complement greatly diminished natural ecosystems at the same time.