Horrenbach-Buchen is a 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...

 in the administrative district of Thun

Thun (administrative district)

Thun District in the Canton of Bern was created on 1 January 2010. It is part of the Oberland administrative region. It contains 35 municipalities with an area of and a population of 103,233....

 in the canton

Cantons of Switzerland

The 26 cantons of Switzerland are the member states of the federal state of Switzerland. Each canton was a fully sovereign state with its own borders, army and currency from the Treaty of Westphalia until the establishment of the Swiss federal state in 1848...

 of Bern 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....

.

Geography

Horrenbach-Buchen has an area, , of 20.44 km² (7.9 sq mi). Of this area, 10.22 km² (3.9 sq mi) or 50.0% is used for agricultural purposes, while 8.06 km² (3.1 sq mi) or 39.4% is forested. Of the rest of the land, 0.27 km² (0.104247582819984 sq mi) or 1.3% is settled (buildings or roads), 0.24 km² (0.0926645180622084 sq mi) or 1.2% is either rivers or lakes and 1.61 km² (0.621624475333981 sq mi) or 7.9% is unproductive land.

Of the built up area, housing and buildings made up 0.6% and transportation infrastructure made up 0.7%. 33.5% of the total land area is heavily forested and 4.3% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 14.0% is pastures and 35.5% is used for alpine pastures. All the water in the municipality is in rivers and streams. Of the unproductive areas, 4.4% is unproductive vegetation and 3.5% is too rocky for vegetation.

The municipality is located in the mountains on the left side of the Zulg river valley. It consists of scattered 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...

 and individual houses. The Teuffenbach (Teuffen stream) divides the municipality into two sections, the western section of Buchen and the eastern section of Horrenbach.

Demographics

Horrenbach-Buchen has a population (as of ) of . , 0.7% of the population was made up of foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years the population has decreased at a rate of -1.4%. All of the population speaks German.

In the 2007 election the most popular party was the SVP

Swiss People's Party

The Swiss People's Party , also known as the Democratic Union of the Centre , is a conservative political party in Switzerland. Chaired by Toni Brunner, but spearheaded by Christoph Blocher, the party is the largest party in the Federal Assembly, with 58 members of the National Council and 6 of...

 which received 80.4% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the local small left-wing parties (8.6%), the CSP

Christian Social Party (Switzerland)

The Christian Social Party is a political party in Switzerland. The CSP is more social democratic than the CVP. With the moderate Christian left as its background, the CSP commits itself to social democratic and environmentalist political solutions...

 (3.7%) and the SPS

Social Democratic Party of Switzerland

The Social Democratic Party of Switzerland is the largest centre-left political party in Switzerland....

 (2.9%).

The age distribution of the population is children and teenagers (0–19 years old) make up 27.9% of the population, while adults (20–64 years old) make up 53.2% and seniors (over 64 years old) make up 18.9%. The entire Swiss population is generally well educated. In Horrenbach-Buchen about 45.9% of the population (between age 25-64) have completed either non-mandatory upper secondary education or 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...

).

Horrenbach-Buchen has an unemployment rate of 1.39%. , there were 39 people employed in the primary economic sector and about 14 businesses involved in this sector. 12 people are employed in the secondary sector and there are 5 businesses in this sector. 9 people are employed in the tertiary sector, with 3 businesses in this sector.
The historical population is given in the following table:

year	population
1764	229
1850	350
1900	359
1910	369
1950	354
1980	267
2000	222