In the mid-20th century, as Afghanistan became the target of international development from both the Western and Soviet world, agricultural-industrial projects were initiated in Baghlan. These included factories for the production of sugar from sugar beets (initiated by Czech experts in the 1940s[8]) and for vegetable oil.[9] Czech expertise also figured heavily into the development of Baghlans' coal-mining industry,[10] centred at Baghlan's Karkar Valley, the only coal mine in Afghanistan to remain operational up through 1992.[11]