 During this time, Pashtun settlers in Takhar Province pushed Moghol, Tajik, and Qarluq farmers as well as Uzbek herders out of irrigated lowlands and into foothills with little agricultural value.As a result of the 19th and 20th century Pashtun colonization policies that Afghan governments pursued, Pashtuns became the dominant ethnic group in the developed agricultural areas in northern Afghanistan, while other ethnic groups (especially the Uzbeks) came to dominate in the underdeveloped foothills.By the start of the 1970s, ethnic Pashtuns constituted 56% of the total population in the Baghlan area, 61% of the total population in the Puli Khumri area, 41% of the total population in the Tajik-plurality Kunduz area, 45% of the total population in the Khanabad area, and just 10% of the total population in the Uzbek-majority Taloqan area.