The Tajik government has approved a plan for the voluntary resettlement of inhabitants of mountain regions to the plains. The objective of the plan, which is to be implemented in 2003-07, is to provide jobs for the mountain dwellers and reduce poverty, according to the presidential press service. The Finance Ministry has been instructed to provide subsidized loans to families who want to resettle. Loan recipients will have to repay only 50 percent of the amount borrowed. In the 1930s, Moscow ordered the resettlement of Tajik mountain people to the plains to boost cotton production. Many of those migrants subsequently returned to the mountains. (Asia Plus-Blitz)