Port-Valais
Encyclopedia
Port-Valais is a municipality
of the district of Monthey in the French
-speaking part of the canton
of Valais
in Switzerland
.
Of the built up area, housing and buildings made up 4.9% and transportation infrastructure made up 3.8%. Power and water infrastructure as well as other special developed areas made up 1.3% of the area while parks, green belts and sports fields made up 1.1%. Out of the forested land, 51.5% of the total land area is heavily forested and 1.4% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 16.3% is used for growing crops and 2.6% is pastures, while 1.5% is used for orchards or vine crops and 3.0% is used for alpine pastures. Of the water in the municipality, 0.5% is in lakes and 2.6% is in rivers and streams. Of the unproductive areas, 3.8% is unproductive vegetation and 4.0% is too rocky for vegetation.
The municipality is located in the Monthey district, at the mouth of the Rhone
into Lake Geneva
. It consists of the villages of Le Bouveret and Les Evouettes and the hamlet
of Port-Valais.
of the municipal coat of arms
is Per fess Azure Scales between four Mullets of Five in fess Or and Sable an Anchor Argent.
Most of the population speaks French (1,903 or 80.5%) as their first language, German
is the second most common (107 or 4.5%) and English
is the third (54 or 2.3%). There are 32 people who speak Italian
.
, the population was 50.4% male and 49.6% female. The population was made up of 1,129 Swiss men (35.5% of the population) and 472 (14.9%) non-Swiss men. There were 1,138 Swiss women (35.8%) and 438 (13.8%) non-Swiss women. Of the population in the municipality, 677 or about 28.6% were born in Port-Valais and lived there in 2000. There were 343 or 14.5% who were born in the same canton, while 684 or 28.9% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 638 or 27.0% were born outside of Switzerland.
, children and teenagers (0–19 years old) make up 25.3% of the population, while adults (20–64 years old) make up 63.5% and seniors (over 64 years old) make up 11.2%.
, there were 1,076 people who were single and never married in the municipality. There were 1,023 married individuals, 127 widows or widowers and 138 individuals who are divorced.
, there were 922 private households in the municipality, and an average of 2.2 persons per household. There were 357 households that consist of only one person and 45 households with five or more people. , a total of 715 apartments (64.0% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 383 apartments (34.3%) were seasonally occupied and 19 apartments (1.7%) were empty. , the construction rate of new housing units was 1.3 new units per 1000 residents. The vacancy rate for the municipality, , was 0.4%.
The historical population is given in the following chart:
the most popular party was the CVP
which received 33.53% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the SVP
(23.78%), the FDP
(21.11%) and the SP
(12.24%). In the federal election, a total of 881 votes were cast, and the voter turnout
was 49.6%.
In the 2009 Conseil d'Etat/Staatsrat
election a total of 790 votes were cast, of which 53 or about 6.7% were invalid. The voter participation was 43.7%, which is much less than the cantonal average of 54.67%. In the 2007 Swiss Council of States election
election a total of 852 votes were cast, of which 74 or about 8.7% were invalid. The voter participation was 48.5%, which is much less than the cantonal average of 59.88%.
the total number of full-time equivalent
jobs was 504. The number of jobs in the primary sector was 20, of which 19 were in agriculture and 1 was in fishing or fisheries. The number of jobs in the secondary sector was 127 of which 58 or (45.7%) were in manufacturing, 34 or (26.8%) were in mining and 36 (28.3%) were in construction. The number of jobs in the tertiary sector was 357. In the tertiary sector; 61 or 17.1% were in the sale or repair of motor vehicles, 27 or 7.6% were in the movement and storage of goods, 66 or 18.5% were in a hotel or restaurant, 5 or 1.4% were in the information industry, 4 or 1.1% were the insurance or financial industry, 13 or 3.6% were technical professionals or scientists, 81 or 22.7% were in education and 13 or 3.6% were in health care.
, there were 374 workers who commuted into the municipality and 708 workers who commuted away. The municipality is a net exporter of workers, with about 1.9 workers leaving the municipality for every one entering. About 20.9% of the workforce coming into Port-Valais are coming from outside Switzerland. Of the working population, 8.5% used public transportation to get to work, and 74.4% used a private car.
. Of the rest of the population, there were 32 members of an Orthodox church
(or about 1.35% of the population), there were 4 individuals (or about 0.17% of the population) who belonged to the Christian Catholic Church
, and there were 46 individuals (or about 1.95% of the population) who belonged to another Christian church. There were 8 individuals (or about 0.34% of the population) who were Jewish
, and 109 (or about 4.61% of the population) who were Islam
ic. There were 15 individuals who were Buddhist
, 9 individuals who were Hindu
and 8 individuals who belonged to another church. 255 (or about 10.79% of the population) belonged to no church, are agnostic
or atheist
, and 39 individuals (or about 1.65% of the population) did not answer the question.
). Of the 229 who completed tertiary schooling, 50.7% were Swiss men, 27.9% were Swiss women, 15.7% were non-Swiss men and 5.7% were non-Swiss women.
, there were 16 students in Port-Valais who came from another municipality, while 125 residents attended schools outside 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...
of the district of Monthey in the 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...
-speaking part of 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
Port-Valais is first mentioned in 1180 as ad porvalesium. The municipality was formerly known by its German name Portwallis, however, that name is no longer used.Geography
Port-Valais has an area, , of 14.4 square kilometre. Of this area, 3.37 square kilometre or 23.5% is used for agricultural purposes, while 7.68 square kilometre or 53.5% is forested. Of the rest of the land, 1.7 square kilometre or 11.8% is settled (buildings or roads), 0.44 square kilometre or 3.1% is either rivers or lakes and 1.13 square kilometre or 7.9% is unproductive land.Of the built up area, housing and buildings made up 4.9% and transportation infrastructure made up 3.8%. Power and water infrastructure as well as other special developed areas made up 1.3% of the area while parks, green belts and sports fields made up 1.1%. Out of the forested land, 51.5% of the total land area is heavily forested and 1.4% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 16.3% is used for growing crops and 2.6% is pastures, while 1.5% is used for orchards or vine crops and 3.0% is used for alpine pastures. Of the water in the municipality, 0.5% is in lakes and 2.6% is in rivers and streams. Of the unproductive areas, 3.8% is unproductive vegetation and 4.0% is too rocky for vegetation.
The municipality is located in the Monthey district, at the mouth 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...
into Lake Geneva
Lake Geneva
Lake Geneva or Lake Léman is a lake in Switzerland and France. It is one of the largest lakes in Western Europe. 59.53 % of it comes under the jurisdiction of Switzerland , and 40.47 % under France...
. It consists of the villages of Le Bouveret and Les Evouettes and the hamlet
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 Port-Valais.
Coat of arms
The blazonBlazon
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 fess Azure Scales between four Mullets of Five in fess Or and Sable an Anchor Argent.
Demographics
Port-Valais has a population of . , 28.1% of the population are resident foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years (2000–2010 ) the population has changed at a rate of 26.1%. It has changed at a rate of 27.9% due to migration and at a rate of 2.5% due to births and deaths.Most of the population speaks French (1,903 or 80.5%) 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 (107 or 4.5%) and English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
is the third (54 or 2.3%). There are 32 people who speak 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...
.
, the population was 50.4% male and 49.6% female. The population was made up of 1,129 Swiss men (35.5% of the population) and 472 (14.9%) non-Swiss men. There were 1,138 Swiss women (35.8%) and 438 (13.8%) non-Swiss women. Of the population in the municipality, 677 or about 28.6% were born in Port-Valais and lived there in 2000. There were 343 or 14.5% who were born in the same canton, while 684 or 28.9% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 638 or 27.0% were born outside of Switzerland.
, children and teenagers (0–19 years old) make up 25.3% of the population, while adults (20–64 years old) make up 63.5% and seniors (over 64 years old) make up 11.2%.
, there were 1,076 people who were single and never married in the municipality. There were 1,023 married individuals, 127 widows or widowers and 138 individuals who are divorced.
, there were 922 private households in the municipality, and an average of 2.2 persons per household. There were 357 households that consist of only one person and 45 households with five or more people. , a total of 715 apartments (64.0% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 383 apartments (34.3%) were seasonally occupied and 19 apartments (1.7%) were empty. , the construction rate of new housing units was 1.3 new units per 1000 residents. The vacancy rate for the municipality, , was 0.4%.
The historical population is given in the following chart:
Politics
In the 2007 federal electionSwiss 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 33.53% 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...
(23.78%), 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....
(21.11%) and the SP
Social Democratic Party of Switzerland
The Social Democratic Party of Switzerland is the largest centre-left political party in Switzerland....
(12.24%). In the federal election, a total of 881 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 49.6%.
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 790 votes were cast, of which 53 or about 6.7% were invalid. The voter participation was 43.7%, which is much less than 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 852 votes were cast, of which 74 or about 8.7% were invalid. The voter participation was 48.5%, which is much less than the cantonal average of 59.88%.
Economy
, Port-Valais had an unemployment rate of 4.4%. , there were 28 people employed in the primary economic sector and about 12 businesses involved in this sector. 134 people were employed in the secondary sector and there were 22 businesses in this sector. 467 people were employed in the tertiary sector, with 78 businesses in this sector. There were 1,061 residents of the municipality who were employed in some capacity, of which females made up 42.4% 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 504. The number of jobs in the primary sector was 20, of which 19 were in agriculture and 1 was in fishing or fisheries. The number of jobs in the secondary sector was 127 of which 58 or (45.7%) were in manufacturing, 34 or (26.8%) were in mining and 36 (28.3%) were in construction. The number of jobs in the tertiary sector was 357. In the tertiary sector; 61 or 17.1% were in the sale or repair of motor vehicles, 27 or 7.6% were in the movement and storage of goods, 66 or 18.5% were in a hotel or restaurant, 5 or 1.4% were in the information industry, 4 or 1.1% were the insurance or financial industry, 13 or 3.6% were technical professionals or scientists, 81 or 22.7% were in education and 13 or 3.6% were in health care.
, there were 374 workers who commuted into the municipality and 708 workers who commuted away. The municipality is a net exporter of workers, with about 1.9 workers leaving the municipality for every one entering. About 20.9% of the workforce coming into Port-Valais are coming from outside Switzerland. Of the working population, 8.5% used public transportation to get to work, and 74.4% used a private car.
Religion
From the , 1,418 or 60.0% were Roman Catholic, while 442 or 18.7% belonged to the Swiss Reformed ChurchSwiss 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 32 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 1.35% of the population), there were 4 individuals (or about 0.17% of the population) who belonged to the Christian Catholic Church
Christian Catholic Church of Switzerland
The Christian Catholic Church of Switzerland is the Swiss member church of the Union of Utrecht, also known as Old Catholic Church, originally founded by the jansenists, with a later influx of discontented Catholics following their disappointment with the First Vatican Council. It has 14,000...
, and there were 46 individuals (or about 1.95% of the population) who belonged to another Christian church. There were 8 individuals (or about 0.34% of the population) who were Jewish
Judaism
Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...
, and 109 (or about 4.61% 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 were 15 individuals who were 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...
, 9 individuals who were Hindu
Hinduism
Hinduism is the predominant and indigenous religious tradition of the Indian Subcontinent. Hinduism is known to its followers as , amongst many other expressions...
and 8 individuals who belonged to another church. 255 (or about 10.79% 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 39 individuals (or about 1.65% of the population) did not answer the question.
Education
In Port-Valais about 832 or (35.2%) of the population have completed non-mandatory upper secondary education, and 229 or (9.7%) have completed additional higher education (either university or a FachhochschuleFachhochschule
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 229 who completed tertiary schooling, 50.7% were Swiss men, 27.9% were Swiss women, 15.7% were non-Swiss men and 5.7% were non-Swiss women.
, there were 16 students in Port-Valais who came from another municipality, while 125 residents attended schools outside the municipality.