Salins, Switzerland
Encyclopedia
Salins 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 district of Sion 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 Valais
Valais
The Valais is one of the 26 cantons of Switzerland in the southwestern part of the country, around the valley of the Rhône from its headwaters to Lake Geneva, separating the Pennine Alps from the Bernese Alps. The canton is one of the drier parts of Switzerland in its central Rhône valley...

 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

Salins is first mentioned in 1200 as Salaig. In 1227 it was mentioned as Salen. The municipality was formerly known by its German name Schalein, however, that name is no longer used.

Geography

Salins has an area, , of 4.1 square kilometre. Of this area, 1.35 square kilometre or 32.6% is used for agricultural purposes, while 2.12 square kilometre or 51.2% is forested. Of the rest of the land, 0.61 square kilometre or 14.7% is settled (buildings or roads) and 0.03 km² (7.4 acre) or 0.7% is unproductive land.

Of the built up area, housing and buildings made up 8.5% and transportation infrastructure made up 4.8%. Out of the forested land, 43.7% of the total land area is heavily forested and 7.5% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 0.0% is used for growing crops and 12.3% is pastures, while 17.1% is used for orchards or vine crops and 3.1% is used for alpine pastures.

The municipality is located in the Sion district, on the left bank of the Rhone
Rhône
Rhone can refer to:* Rhone, one of the major rivers of Europe, running through Switzerland and France* Rhône Glacier, the source of the Rhone River and one of the primary contributors to Lake Geneva in the far eastern end of the canton of Valais in Switzerland...

 river. It consists of the village of Salins-Village and several 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...

.

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 Azure, between two Mullets [of Six] Or as many Garbs of the same in saltire.

Demographics

Salins has a population of . , 8.5% of the population are resident foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years (2000–2010 ) the population has changed at a rate of 14.4%. It has changed at a rate of 6.1% due to migration and at a rate of 2.8% due to births and deaths.

Most of the population 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...

 (841 or 95.2%) as their first language, 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....

 is the second most common (23 or 2.6%) and Italian
Italian language
Italian is a Romance language spoken mainly in Europe: Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City, by minorities in Malta, Monaco, Croatia, Slovenia, France, Libya, Eritrea, and Somalia, and by immigrant communities in the Americas and Australia...

 is the third (7 or 0.8%).

, the population was 48.7% male and 51.3% female. The population was made up of 426 Swiss men (43.8% of the population) and 47 (4.8%) non-Swiss men. There were 449 Swiss women (46.2%) and 50 (5.1%) non-Swiss women. Of the population in the municipality, 330 or about 37.4% were born in Salins and lived there in 2000. There were 356 or 40.3% who were born in the same canton, while 101 or 11.4% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 83 or 9.4% were born outside of Switzerland.

, children and teenagers (0-19 years old) make up 24.6% of the population, while adults (20-64 years old) make up 59.2% and seniors (over 64 years old) make up 16.2%.

, there were 328 people who were single and never married in the municipality. There were 465 married individuals, 62 widows or widowers and 28 individuals who are divorced.

, there were 339 private households in the municipality, and an average of 2.5 persons per household. There were 72 households that consist of only one person and 30 households with five or more people. , a total of 330 apartments (74.8% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 94 apartments (21.3%) were seasonally occupied and 17 apartments (3.9%) were empty. The vacancy rate for the municipality, , was 1.05%.

The historical population is given in the following chart:

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 most popular party was 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...

 which received 36.54% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were 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...

 (21.37%), the SP
Social Democratic Party of Switzerland
The Social Democratic Party of Switzerland is the largest centre-left political party in Switzerland....

 (16.72%) and the FDP
FDP.The Liberals
FDP.The Liberals is a classical liberal political party in Switzerland. It is the joint-largest party in the Federal Council, third-largest party in the National Council, and second-largest in the Council of States....

 (14.98%). In the federal election, a total of 485 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 68.1%.

In the 2009 Conseil d'Etat/Staatsrat
Conseil d'Etat (Switzerland)
In Switzerland, Conseil d'Etat is the name of the council constituting the cantonal government of French-speaking cantons. It is not to be confused with the Conseil des États which is a chamber of the Swiss parliament....

 election a total of 380 votes were cast, of which 29 or about 7.6% were invalid. The voter participation was 55.2%, which is similar to the cantonal average of 54.67%. In the 2007 Swiss Council of States election
Swiss Council of States election, 2007
Elections were held to the Council of States of Switzerland in October and November 2007 as part of the 2007 federal election. All 46 members of the Council of States were elected from all cantons of Switzerland. The first round was held on 21 October...

 election a total of 469 votes were cast, of which 43 or about 9.2% were invalid. The voter participation was 68.2%, which is much more than the cantonal average of 59.88%.

Economy

, Salins had an unemployment rate of 3.7%. , there were 75 people employed in the primary economic sector and about 17 businesses involved in this sector. 34 people were employed in the secondary sector and there were 8 businesses in this sector. 115 people were employed in the tertiary sector, with 23 businesses in this sector. There were 418 residents of the municipality who were employed in some capacity, of which females made up 40.9% 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 167. The number of jobs in the primary sector was 37, all of which were in agriculture. The number of jobs in the secondary sector was 32 of which 11 or (34.4%) were in manufacturing and 21 (65.6%) were in construction. The number of jobs in the tertiary sector was 98. In the tertiary sector; 30 or 30.6% were in the sale or repair of motor vehicles, 32 or 32.7% were in the movement and storage of goods, 4 or 4.1% were in a hotel or restaurant, 2 or 2.0% were in the information industry, 12 or 12.2% were technical professionals or scientists, 8 or 8.2% were in education.

, there were 56 workers who commuted into the municipality and 344 workers who commuted away. The municipality is a net exporter of workers, with about 6.1 workers leaving the municipality for every one entering. Of the working population, 7.9% used public transportation to get to work, and 81.8% used a private car.

Religion

From the , 757 or 85.7% were Roman Catholic, while 50 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 was 1 member of an Orthodox church
Orthodox Christianity
The term Orthodox Christianity may refer to:* the Eastern Orthodox Church and its various geographical subdivisions...

, and there were 8 individuals (or about 0.91% of the population) who belonged to another Christian church. There were 5 (or about 0.57% 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. There was 1 person who was Buddhist
Buddhism
Buddhism is a religion and philosophy encompassing a variety of traditions, beliefs and practices, largely based on teachings attributed to Siddhartha Gautama, commonly known as the Buddha . The Buddha lived and taught in the northeastern Indian subcontinent some time between the 6th and 4th...

 and 1 individual who belonged to another church. 36 (or about 4.08% 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 28 individuals (or about 3.17% of the population) did not answer the question.

Education

In Salins about 328 or (37.1%) of the population have completed non-mandatory upper secondary education, and 110 or (12.5%) 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 110 who completed tertiary schooling, 56.4% were Swiss men, 32.7% were Swiss women, 7.3% were non-Swiss men.

, there were 8 students in Salins who came from another municipality, while 69 residents attended schools outside the municipality.

External links

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