Gonten
Encyclopedia
Gonten District is a district of the canton of Appenzell Innerrhoden
Appenzell Innerrhoden
Appenzell Innerrhoden is the smallest canton of Switzerland by population and the second smallest by area, Basel-City having less area.-Foundation:...

 in Switzerland
Switzerland
Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....

.

History

Gonten is first mentioned in 1200 as Gumbton. This refers to a pool of water, which points at the nearby peat-bog.

Geography

Gonten has an area, , of 24.7 square kilometres (9.5 sq mi). Of this area, 61.7% is used for agricultural purposes, while 32.0% is forested. Of the rest of the land, 4.9% is settled (buildings or roads) and 1.4% is unproductive land.

The district is located in the inner portion of the half canton. It consists of the linear village
Linear village
In geography, a linear village, or linear settlement, is a small to medium-sized settlement that is formed around a transport route, such as a road, river, or canal. Wraysbury, a village in Berkshire, is one of the longest villages in England....

 of Gonten and the hamlets
Hamlet (place)
A hamlet is usually a rural settlement which is too small to be considered a village, though sometimes the word is used for a different sort of community. Historically, when a hamlet became large enough to justify building a church, it was then classified as a village...

 of Gontenbad and Jakobsbad.

The municipality
Municipalities of Switzerland
Communes , also known as municipalities, are the smallest government division in Switzerland, numbering 2,596 . While many have a population of a few hundred citizens, the largest cities such as Zürich or Geneva also have the legal status of municipalities...

 was formally established in 1872 when Gonten was joined with the rhodes Stechlenegg and Rinkenbach

Coat of arms

The blazon
Blazon
In heraldry and heraldic vexillology, a blazon is a formal description of a coat of arms, flag or similar emblem, from which the reader can reconstruct the appropriate image...

 of the municipal coat of arms
Coat of arms
A coat of arms is a unique heraldic design on a shield or escutcheon or on a surcoat or tabard used to cover and protect armour and to identify the wearer. Thus the term is often stated as "coat-armour", because it was anciently displayed on the front of a coat of cloth...

 is Per pale Or and Gules two Pilgrim Sticks counterchanged and overall a Base Vert.

The bottom of the coat of arms is green. The background of the coat of arms is divided into red and gold. There are two pilgrim staffs, one each on the red and golden area respectively. A red staff is placed on the golden background, a golden one on the red background. The pilgirm staffs symbolize the apostle Jacob the elder. There is a chapel on the Kronberg mountain dedicated to Jacob the elder.

Demographics

Gonten has a population of . , 3.8% of the population are resident foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years (1999-2009 ) the population has changed at a rate of 0.1%. It has changed at a rate of 5.2% due to migration and at a rate of -0.1% due to births and deaths.

Most of the population speaks German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....

 (1,353 or 98.1%), with Albanian
Albanian language
Albanian is an Indo-European language spoken by approximately 7.6 million people, primarily in Albania and Kosovo but also in other areas of the Balkans in which there is an Albanian population, including western Macedonia, southern Montenegro, southern Serbia and northwestern Greece...

 being second most common (10 or 0.7%) and Serbo-Croatian
Serbo-Croatian
Serbo-Croatian or Serbo-Croat, less commonly Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian , is a South Slavic language with multiple standards and the primary language of Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Montenegro...

 being third (6 or 0.4%). There is 1 person who speaks French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...

.

Of the population in the district 830 or about 60.2% were born in Gonten and lived there in 2000. There were 231 or 16.8% who were born in the same canton, while 254 or 18.4% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 48 or 3.5% were born outside of Switzerland.

In there were no live births to Swiss citizens and no deaths in the district. Ignoring immigration and emigration, the population of Swiss citizens remained the same while the foreign population remained the same. There was 1 Swiss man who immigrated back to Switzerland and 2 Swiss women who emigrated from Switzerland. At the same time, there were 3 non-Swiss men and 4 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 a decrease of 11 and the non-Swiss population increased by 11 people. This represents a population growth rate of 0.0%.

, there were 688 people who were single and never married in the district. There were 574 married individuals, 96 widows or widowers and 21 individuals who are divorced.

the average number of residents per living room was 0.62 which is about equal to the cantonal average of 0.59 per room. In this case, a room is defined as space of a housing unit of at least 4 m² (43.1 sq ft) as normal bedrooms, dining rooms, living rooms, kitchens and habitable cellars and attics. About 65.5% of the total households were owner occupied, or in other words did not pay rent (though they may have a mortgage
Mortgage loan
A mortgage loan is a loan secured by real property through the use of a mortgage note which evidences the existence of the loan and the encumbrance of that realty through the granting of a mortgage which secures the loan...

 or a rent-to-own agreement).

, there were 447 private households in the district, and an average of 2.9 persons per household. There were 124 households that consist of only one person and 101 households with five or more people. Out of a total of 457 households that answered this question, 27.1% were households made up of just one person and there were 14 adults who lived with their parents. Of the rest of the households, there are 97 married couples without children, 188 married couples with children There were 17 single parents with a child or children. There were 7 households that were made up of unrelated people and 10 households that were made up of some sort of institution or another collective housing.

there were 157 single family homes (or 36.9% of the total) out of a total of 425 inhabited buildings. There were 49 multi-family buildings (11.5%), along with 194 multi-purpose buildings that were mostly used for housing (45.6%) and 25 other use buildings (commercial or industrial) that also had some housing (5.9%). Of the single family homes 56 were built before 1919, while 17 were built between 1990 and 2000.

there were 539 apartments in the district. The most common apartment size was 4 rooms of which there were 128. There were 15 single room apartments and 245 apartments with five or more rooms. Of these apartments, a total of 432 apartments (80.1% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 81 apartments (15.0%) were seasonally occupied and 26 apartments (4.8%) were empty. , the construction rate of new housing units was 2.8 new units per 1000 residents. The vacancy rate for the district, , was 1.03%.

The historical population is given in the following chart:

Heritage sites of national significance

The Bürgerhaus Roothuus is listed as a Swiss heritage site of national significance
Swiss Inventory of Cultural Property of National and Regional Significance
The Swiss Inventory of Cultural Property of National and Regional Significance is a register of some 8,300 items of cultural property in Switzerland...

.

Politics

In the 2007 federal election
Swiss federal election, 2007
Elections to the Swiss Federal Assembly, the federal parliament of Switzerland, were held on Sunday, 21 October 2007. In a few cantons, a second round of the elections to the Council of States was held on 11 November, 18 November, and 25 November 2007...

 the CVP
Christian Democratic People's Party of Switzerland
The Christian Democratic People's Party of Switzerland is a Christian democratic political party in Switzerland. It is the fourth-largest party in the National Council, with 31 seats, and the largest in the Council of States, with 15 seats. It has one seat, that of Doris Leuthard, on the Swiss...

 received 81.9% of the vote. In the federal election, a total of 226 votes were cast, and the voter turnout
Voter turnout
Voter turnout is the percentage of eligible voters who cast a ballot in an election . After increasing for many decades, there has been a trend of decreasing voter turnout in most established democracies since the 1960s...

 was 21.1%.

Economy

, Gonten had an unemployment rate of 0.3%. , there were 200 people employed in the primary economic sector and about 94 businesses involved in this sector. 125 people were employed in the secondary sector and there were 15 businesses in this sector. 234 people were employed in the tertiary sector, with 40 businesses in this sector. There were 675 residents of the district who were employed in some capacity, of which females made up 38.2% of the workforce.

the total number of full-time equivalent
Full-time equivalent
Full-time equivalent , is a unit to measure employed persons or students in a way that makes them comparable although they may work or study a different number of hours per week. FTE is often used to measure a worker's involvement in a project, or to track cost reductions in an organization...

 jobs was 440. The number of jobs in the primary sector was 148, all of which were in agriculture. The number of jobs in the secondary sector was 112 of which 80 or (71.4%) were in manufacturing and 32 (28.6%) were in construction. The number of jobs in the tertiary sector was 180. In the tertiary sector; 32 or 17.8% were in the sale or repair of motor vehicles, 20 or 11.1% were in the movement and storage of goods, 45 or 25.0% were in a hotel or restaurant, 6 or 3.3% were the insurance or financial industry, 6 or 3.3% were technical professionals or scientists, 9 or 5.0% were in education and 37 or 20.6% were in health care.

, there were 131 workers who commuted into the district and 311 workers who commuted away. The district is a net exporter of workers, with about 2.4 workers leaving the district for every one entering. Of the working population, 5.8% used public transportation to get to work, and 44% used a private car.

Religion

From the , 1,245 or 90.3% were Roman Catholic, while 78 or 5.7% belonged to the Swiss Reformed Church
Swiss Reformed Church
The Reformed branch of Protestantism in Switzerland was started in Zürich by Huldrych Zwingli and spread within a few years to Basel , Bern , St...

. Of the rest of the population, there were 3 members of an Orthodox church
Orthodox Christianity
The term Orthodox Christianity may refer to:* the Eastern Orthodox Church and its various geographical subdivisions...

 (or about 0.22% of the population), and there were 7 individuals (or about 0.51% of the population) who belonged to another Christian church. There were 15 (or about 1.09% of the population) who were Islam
Islam
Islam . The most common are and .   : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...

ic. 22 (or about 1.60% of the population) belonged to no church, are agnostic
Agnosticism
Agnosticism is the view that the truth value of certain claims—especially claims about the existence or non-existence of any deity, but also other religious and metaphysical claims—is unknown or unknowable....

 or atheist
Atheism
Atheism is, in a broad sense, the rejection of belief in the existence of deities. In a narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there are no deities...

, and 9 individuals (or about 0.65% of the population) did not answer the question.

Education

In Gonten about 389 or (28.2%) of the population have completed non-mandatory upper secondary education, and 75 or (5.4%) have completed additional higher education (either University or a Fachhochschule
Fachhochschule
A Fachhochschule or University of Applied Sciences is a German type of tertiary education institution, sometimes specialized in certain topical areas . Fachhochschulen were founded in Germany and later adopted by Austria, Liechtenstein, Switzerland and Greece...

). Of the 75 who completed tertiary schooling, 74.7% were Swiss men, 14.7% were Swiss women, 8.0% were non-Swiss men.

, there was one student in Gonten who came from another district, while 116 residents attended schools outside the district.

External links

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