Niederbipp 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 Oberaargau administrative district 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....

.

History

Niederbipp is first mentioned in 968 as Pippa. In 1302 it was mentioned as Nider-Bippe.

Geography

Niederbipp has an area, , of 17.37 square kilometres (6.7 sq mi). Of this area, 8.2 km² (3.2 sq mi) or 47.2% is used for agricultural purposes, while 6.55 km² (2.5 sq mi) or 37.7% is forested. Of the rest of the land, 2.64 km² (1 sq mi) or 15.2% is settled (buildings or roads) and 0.06 km² (14.8 acre) or 0.3% is unproductive land.

Of the built up area, industrial buildings made up 1.9% of the total area while housing and buildings made up 5.9% and transportation infrastructure made up 5.0%. Power and water infrastructure as well as other special developed areas made up 1.7% of the area Out of the forested land, 36.6% of the total land area is heavily forested and 1.2% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 34.1% is used for growing crops and 10.6% is pastures, while 1.3% is used for orchards or vine crops and 1.2% is used for alpine pastures.

The municipality is located on the southern flank of the Jura mountains

Jura mountains

The Jura Mountains are a small mountain range located north of the Alps, separating the Rhine and Rhone rivers and forming part of the watershed of each...

. It includes the village of Niederbipp, 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 Walde, Holzhüsere and Lehn and scattered individual houses.

Demographics

Niederbipp has a population (as of ) of . , 18.0% of the population was made up of foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years the population has grown at a rate of 5.1%. Most of the population speaks German (89.0%), with Serbo-Croatian being second most common ( 3.1%) and Albanian being third ( 1.8%).

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 43.8% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the SPS

Social Democratic Party of Switzerland

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

 (19.8%), the FDP

Free Democratic Party of Switzerland

The Free Democratic Party was a classical liberal political party in Switzerland. It was one of the major parties in Switzerland until its merger with the smaller classical liberal Liberal Party, to form FDP.The Liberals on 1 January 2009....

 (19.2%) and the Green Party

Green Party of Switzerland

The Green Party of Switzerland is the fifth-largest party in the National Council of Switzerland, and the largest party that is not represented on the Federal Council.-History:...

 (6.2%).

The age distribution of the population is children and teenagers (0–19 years old) make up 25.5% of the population, while adults (20–64 years old) make up 58.2% and seniors (over 64 years old) make up 16.3%. In Niederbipp about 69.3% 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...

).

Niederbipp has an unemployment rate of 1.79%. , there were 255 people employed in the primary economic sector and about 46 businesses involved in this sector. 623 people are employed in the secondary sector and there are 55 businesses in this sector. 853 people are employed in the tertiary sector, with 105 businesses in this sector.
The historical population is given in the following table:

year	population
1764	1,041
1850	2,337
1900	2,245
1950	3,050
2000	3,930

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