Across the deserts of northern China, a quiet, repetitive movement has played out for nearly 50 years: People bending down, pressing long straw bundles into shifting sand, then planting tiny saplings in the empty squares they’ve created. It looks simple, almost ordinary.

For half a century, workers in northern China have been using a technique called "straw checkerboards" to combat desertification

KUBUQI DESERT, China (AP) — For half a century, millions of workers have repeated a task across the deserts in northern China: inserting forearm-length sticks into shifting sand,…