Bucheggberg District

Bucheggberg District is one of the ten districts of the canton of Solothurn in Switzerland, situated to the southwest of the canton. Together with the Wasseramt District, it forms the Amtei (electoral district) of Wasseramt-Bucheggberg. It has a population of 7,596 (as of 31 December 2010).

Contents

Municipalities

Bucheggberg District contains the following municipalities:

Coat of arms Municipality Population
(31 December 2010)[1]		 Area, km²
Aetigkofen 176 2.03
Aetingen 304 2.85
Bibern 250 2.99
Biezwil 326 4.18
Brügglen 205 1.70
Gossliwil 193 1.98
Hessigkofen 265 2.25
Küttigkofen 255 2.17
Kyburg-Buchegg 348 1.61
Lüsslingen 516 3.22
Lüterkofen-Ichertswil 734 4.40
Lüterswil-Gächliwil 335 3.09
Messen 1,436 11.88a
Mühledorf 328 3.32
Nennigkofen 486 4.60
Schnottwil 1,026 7.19
Tscheppach 198 1.86
Unterramsern 215 1.54
Total 7,596 62.86
^a Includes the area of Balm bei Messen, Brunnenthal and Oberramsern which merged into Messen 1 January 2010.

Mergers

On 1 January 1961 the former municipalities of Lüterkofen and Ichertswil merged to form the new municipality of Lüterkofen-Ichertswil.

On 1 January 1995 the former municipalities of Gächliwil and Lüterswil merged to form the new municipality of Lüterswil-Gächliwil.[2]

On 1 January 2010 the municipalities of Balm bei Messen, Brunnenthal, and Oberramsern merged into the municipality of Messen.[3]

Geography

Bucheggberg district has an area, as of 2009, of 62.81 square kilometers (24.25 sq mi). Of this area, 36.8 km2 (14.2 sq mi) or 58.6% is used for agricultural purposes, while 20.09 km2 (7.76 sq mi) or 32.0% is forested. Of the rest of the land, 5.35 km2 (2.07 sq mi) or 8.5% is settled (buildings or roads), 0.53 km2 (0.20 sq mi) or 0.8% is either rivers or lakes and 0.04 km2 (9.9 acres) or 0.1% is unproductive land.[4]

Of the built up area, housing and buildings made up 4.3% and transportation infrastructure made up 2.9%. Out of the forested land, all of the forested land area is covered with heavy forests. Of the agricultural land, 57.2% is used for growing crops, while 1.4% is used for orchards or vine crops. All the water in the municipality is flowing water.[4]

Coat of arms

The blazon of the municipal coat of arms is Or three Roses Gules barbed and seeded proper in pale.[5]

Demographics

Bucheggberg district has a population (as of December 2010) of 7,596.[1]

Most of the population (as of 2000) speaks German (6,909 or 97.4%), with French being second most common (63 or 0.9%) and English being third (15 or 0.2%). There are 4 people who speak Romansh.[6]

As of 2008, the gender distribution of the population was 50.0% male and 50.0% female. The population was made up of 3,606 Swiss men (47.1% of the population) and 219 (2.9%) non-Swiss men. There were 3,639 Swiss women (47.5%) and 193 (2.5%) non-Swiss women.[7] Of the population in the district 2,524 or about 35.6% were born in the district and lived there in 2000. There were 1,556 or 21.9% who were born in the same canton, while 2,483 or 35.0% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 356 or 5.0% were born outside of Switzerland.[6]

In 2008 there were 77 live births to Swiss citizens and 4 births to non-Swiss citizens, and in same time span there were 55 deaths of Swiss citizens. Ignoring immigration and emigration, the population of Swiss citizens increased by 22 while the foreign population increased by 4. There were 4 Swiss men and 8 Swiss women who immigrated back to Switzerland. At the same time, there were 17 non-Swiss men and 17 non-Swiss women who immigrated from another country to Switzerland. The total Swiss population change in 2008 (from all sources, including moves across municipal borders) was an increase of 34 and the non-Swiss population increased by 33 people. This represents a population growth rate of 0.9%.[8]

As of 2000, there were 2,935 people who were single and never married in the district. There were 3,499 married individuals, 371 widows or widowers and 287 individuals who are divorced.[6]

There were 663 households that consist of only one person and 239 households with five or more people. Out of a total of 2,789 households that answered this question, 23.8% were households made up of just one person and 23 were adults who lived with their parents. Of the rest of the households, there are 858 married couples without children, 1,035 married couples with children There were 117 single parents with a child or children. There were 35 households that were made up unrelated people and 58 households that were made some sort of institution or another collective housing.[6]

The historical population is given in the following chart:[9]

Politics

In the 2007 federal election the most popular party was the FDP which received 33.63% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the SVP (25.26%), the SP (20.85%) and the Green Party (9.89%). In the federal election, a total of 3,113 votes were cast, and the voter turnout was 53.5%.[10]

Religion

From the 2000 census, 793 or 11.2% were Roman Catholic, while 5,269 or 74.3% belonged to the Swiss Reformed Church. Of the rest of the population, there were 16 members of an Orthodox church (or about 0.23% of the population), there were 28 individuals (or about 0.39% of the population) who belonged to the Christian Catholic Church, and there were 85 individuals (or about 1.20% of the population) who belonged to another Christian church. There were 32 (or about 0.45% of the population) who were Islamic. There were 9 individuals who were Buddhist and 2 individuals who belonged to another church. 723 (or about 10.19% of the population) belonged to no church, are agnostic or atheist, and 135 individuals (or about 1.90% of the population) did not answer the question.[6]

Education

In Bucheggberg about 2,933 or (41.4%) of the population have completed non-mandatory upper secondary education, and 984 or (13.9%) have completed additional higher education (either University or a Fachhochschule). Of the 984 who completed tertiary schooling, 72.5% were Swiss men, 24.6% were Swiss women, 1.9% were non-Swiss men and 1.0% were non-Swiss women.[6]

References

  1. ^ a b Canton Solothurn Statistical Office, MS Excel document – Bevölkerungsbestand nach Gemeinden 31.12.2010 (German) accessed 29 March 2011
  2. ^ Nomenklaturen – Amtliches Gemeindeverzeichnis der Schweiz (German) accessed 4 April 2011
  3. ^ Amtliches Gemeindeverzeichnis der Schweiz, Mutationsmeldungen 2009 / Répertoire officiel des communes de Suisse, Mutations 2009 / Elenco ufficiale dei Comuni della Svizzera, Mutazione 2009 (Report). Federal Statistical Office. 2009. 3162. http://www.bfs.admin.ch/bfs/portal/de/index/infothek/nomenklaturen/blank/blank/gem_liste/03.Document.128095.pdf. Retrieved 6 March 2010. 
  4. ^ a b Swiss Federal Statistical Office-Land Use Statistics 2009 data (German) accessed 25 March 2010
  5. ^ Flags of the World.com accessed 15-March-2011
  6. ^ a b c d e f STAT-TAB Datenwürfel für Thema 40.3 - 2000 (German) accessed 2 February 2011
  7. ^ Canton of Solothurn Statistics - Wohnbevölkerung der Gemeinden nach Nationalität und Geschlecht (German) accessed 11 March 2011
  8. ^ Swiss Federal Statistical Office - Superweb database - Gemeinde Statistics 1981-2008 (German) accessed 19 June 2010
  9. ^ Swiss Federal Statistical Office STAT-TAB Bevölkerungsentwicklung nach Region, 1850-2000 (German) accessed 29 January 2011
  10. ^ Swiss Federal Statistical Office, Nationalratswahlen 2007: Stärke der Parteien und Wahlbeteiligung, nach Gemeinden/Bezirk/Canton (German) accessed 28 May 2010