evidence: Social tensions grew particularly in Isfara district of northern Tajikistan and in Vorukh, an enclave of 30,000 people in the middle of Kyrgyzstan. When private land ownership was introduced in Kyrgyzstan, some rented Tajik pastures were declared Kyrgyz citizens’ property. Gulhumar Zulpukarova, a pensioner from Ak-Sai, a borderland village in the Isfara valley, told The Third Pole that she fled to Kyrgyzstan’s Batken region in 2019 "due to Tajik attacks". She said shepherds from Kyrgyzstan have stopped Tajiks from grazing cattle in recent years, as relations have worsened. [...] There are also ways to minimise the likelihood of conflict over resources. Kurbonali Partoev, an academic at the Tajik Academy of Science’s Institute of Botanics, pointed out that "the harvest of fruit, grain, vegetable and fodder crops here [the Isfara region of Tajikistan] is good. In order to economise water, it would be useful to install drip irrigation or to use rainwater-collection systems. In order to maintain soil fertility, crop rotation is important. New types of crops and new methods of growing them could be employed."