Addressing desertification of land is actually pretty smart. It's not pure charity. The land is actually more valuable when it isn't a desert anymore. If the land can support soil and hold water again, it becomes suitable for farming. If you don that sustainably (i.e. don't allow it to turn it back into desert), that adds to the economy.

There's a lot of degraded land all over the world that with a little bit of focus and attention could be upgraded back to something more valuable.

Some example:

- centuries of overgrazing by sheep and goats has turned much of the middle east into a waste land. Simply keeping sheep off the land with some fences can actually restore land within a few years.

- Places like the UK and Ireland used to be covered in Atlantic Rain forest. Forestry and overgrazing has turned much of both countries into land with very low bio diversity. Restoring forests would be a lot of work. But like the middle east, keeping the sheep from destroying new trees before they have a chance to establish themselves would help. Places like Dartmoor are effectively so barren that the only thing that grows there is a type of grass that even sheep don't like.

- Scotland has a lot of planted pine forests that have drowned out native species. Bio diversity is low.

- Parts of Germany have similar issues with lots of production forests having no bio diversity. There's a crisis in parts of Germany where insects are destroying parts of those forests now. The solution is actually just ripping out the production forests and re-introducing native species.

- Prairies in the US used to be kept in check by herds of bison that no longer exist and are no longer able to migrate around. Continuous cattle overgrazing of the same land destroyed much of the land. It no longer recovers in between grazing. And mono culture of low value crops like corn and soy beans isn't helping either.

There are many more examples around the world. The problems vary from area to area but they have in common that local farmers abuse the land and the land then degrades. Soil erosion, problems with water retention, vastly reduced bio diversity, etc. are the result. The other thing they have in common is that putting a stop to the negative behavior tends to revert some of the effects. In some cases fairly quickly even. And as the Chinese show, putting some effort in can actually work. There's no one size fits all solution. But there are plenty of things that can work.

I live in the UK. Most of our farmland is divided into relatively small parcels owing to geography and history (they were divided long before mechanisation).

However, when you come across a field of wheat, rape or corn it's notable how little diversity there remains. A complete absence of birds or insects for example. The agricultural deserts, I believe, are as damaging as their drought based cousins.

The 8-8-8 rule (8 hrs work, 8 hrs play, 8 hrs sleep) that unions lobbied for during labor reforms helped establish a common sustainable work week. Something similar for land management could go a long way.

33% for farming, 33% for human development, 33% for forest/dense wild. Just an example, but you get the idea.