Well, this was announced with an advance of two seasons
Economy will not be a problem for most of those teams, they are well prepared and won't suffer a lot.
Your suggestion won't be bad in a closed league, but I think for new teams entering during the season it will be a nightmare, and the same for teams just created. And for sure more difficult to code which would be a problem as well.
Ranking is for sure not 100% accurate, but the better option. Another one would be that all teams start in 2nd division, but I'm not sure africa teams would prefer it.