Saillon
Encyclopedia
Saillon is a municipality
in the district of Martigny in the canton
of Valais
in Switzerland
.
Of the built up area, housing and buildings made up 3.3% and transportation infrastructure made up 3.1%. Out of the forested land, 16.8% of the total land area is heavily forested and 3.1% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 6.2% is used for growing crops, while 24.2% is used for orchards or vine crops and 7.0% is used for alpine pastures. All the water in the municipality is flowing water. Of the unproductive areas, 13.2% is unproductive vegetation and 17.9% is too rocky for vegetation.
The municipality is located in the Martigny district, on the right bank of the Rhone
. It consists of the village of Saillon and exclave of Euloi.
Most of the population speaks French
(1,365 or 89.9%) as their first language, Portuguese
is the second most common (85 or 5.6%) and German
is the third (28 or 1.8%). There are 14 people who speak Italian
.
, the population was 50.5% male and 49.5% female. The population was made up of 815 Swiss men (39.2% of the population) and 236 (11.3%) non-Swiss men. There were 814 Swiss women (39.1%) and 215 (10.3%) non-Swiss women. Of the population in the municipality, 627 or about 41.3% were born in Saillon and lived there in 2000. There were 417 or 27.5% who were born in the same canton, while 173 or 11.4% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 258 or 17.0% were born outside of Switzerland.
, children and teenagers (0–19 years old) make up 27.6% of the population, while adults (20–64 years old) make up 58.5% and seniors (over 64 years old) make up 13.9%.
, there were 635 people who were single and never married in the municipality. There were 746 married individuals, 81 widows or widowers and 57 individuals who are divorced.
, there were 593 private households in the municipality, and an average of 2.5 persons per household. There were 169 households that consist of only one person and 51 households with five or more people. , a total of 560 apartments (57.1% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 392 apartments (40.0%) were seasonally occupied and 28 apartments (2.9%) were empty. , the construction rate of new housing units was 9.1 new units per 1000 residents. The vacancy rate for the municipality, , was 4.87%.
The historical population is given in the following chart:
. The entire town of Saillon is part of the Inventory of Swiss Heritage Sites
.
the most popular party was the CVP
which received 42.17% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the FDP
(20.15%), the SVP
(17.88%) and the SP
(10.68%). In the federal election, a total of 710 votes were cast, and the voter turnout
was 60.6%.
In the 2009 Conseil d'Etat/Staatsrat
election a total of 695 votes were cast, of which 60 or about 8.6% were invalid. The voter participation was 55.8%, which is similar to the cantonal average of 54.67%. In the 2007 Swiss Council of States election
election a total of 704 votes were cast, of which 37 or about 5.3% were invalid. The voter participation was 60.4%, which is similar to the cantonal average of 59.88%.
the total number of full-time equivalent
jobs was 441. The number of jobs in the primary sector was 95, all of which were in agriculture. The number of jobs in the secondary sector was 95 of which 16 or (16.8%) were in manufacturing and 39 (41.1%) were in construction. The number of jobs in the tertiary sector was 251. In the tertiary sector; 60 or 23.9% were in the sale or repair of motor vehicles, 5 or 2.0% were in the movement and storage of goods, 45 or 17.9% were in a hotel or restaurant, 6 or 2.4% were in the information industry, 4 or 1.6% were the insurance or financial industry, 4 or 1.6% were technical professionals or scientists, and 31 or 12.4% were in health care.
, there were 216 workers who commuted into the municipality and 433 workers who commuted away. The municipality is a net exporter of workers, with about 2.0 workers leaving the municipality for every one entering. Of the working population, 6% used public transportation to get to work, and 72.7% used a private car.
. Of the rest of the population, there were 2 members of an Orthodox church
(or about 0.13% of the population), and there were 26 individuals (or about 1.71% of the population) who belonged to another Christian church. There were 7 (or about 0.46% of the population) who were Islam
ic. There were 2 individuals who were Buddhist
and 7 individuals who belonged to another church. 60 (or about 3.95% of the population) belonged to no church, are agnostic
or atheist
, and 72 individuals (or about 4.74% of the population) did not answer the question.
). Of the 172 who completed tertiary schooling, 61.0% were Swiss men, 22.7% were Swiss women, 8.7% were non-Swiss men and 7.6% were non-Swiss women.
, there were 2 students in Saillon who came from another municipality, while 177 residents attended schools outside the municipality.
Saillon is home to the Bibliothèque communale et scolaire library. The library has 8,928 books or other media, and loaned out 8,093 items in the same year. It was open a total of 147 days with average of 6 hours per week during that year.
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 Martigny 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
Saillon is first mentioned in 1052 as castellum Psallionis. The municipality was formerly known by its German name Schellon, however, that name is no longer used.Geography
Saillon has an area, , of 13.7 square kilometre. Of this area, 5.17 square kilometre or 37.6% is used for agricultural purposes, while 2.81 square kilometre or 20.5% is forested. Of the rest of the land, 1.12 square kilometre or 8.2% is settled (buildings or roads), 0.31 square kilometre or 2.3% is either rivers or lakes and 4.27 square kilometre or 31.1% is unproductive land.Of the built up area, housing and buildings made up 3.3% and transportation infrastructure made up 3.1%. Out of the forested land, 16.8% of the total land area is heavily forested and 3.1% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 6.2% is used for growing crops, while 24.2% is used for orchards or vine crops and 7.0% is used for alpine pastures. All the water in the municipality is flowing water. Of the unproductive areas, 13.2% is unproductive vegetation and 17.9% is too rocky for vegetation.
The municipality is located in the Martigny district, on the right 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...
. It consists of the village of Saillon and exclave of Euloi.
Demographics
Saillon has a population of . , 19.7% of the population are resident foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years (2000–2010 ) the population has changed at a rate of 38.4%. It has changed at a rate of 34.1% due to migration and at a rate of 5.7% 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...
(1,365 or 89.9%) as their first language, Portuguese
Portuguese language
Portuguese is a Romance language that arose in the medieval Kingdom of Galicia, nowadays Galicia and Northern Portugal. The southern part of the Kingdom of Galicia became independent as the County of Portugal in 1095...
is the second most common (85 or 5.6%) and 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 third (28 or 1.8%). There are 14 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 50.5% male and 49.5% female. The population was made up of 815 Swiss men (39.2% of the population) and 236 (11.3%) non-Swiss men. There were 814 Swiss women (39.1%) and 215 (10.3%) non-Swiss women. Of the population in the municipality, 627 or about 41.3% were born in Saillon and lived there in 2000. There were 417 or 27.5% who were born in the same canton, while 173 or 11.4% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 258 or 17.0% were born outside of Switzerland.
, children and teenagers (0–19 years old) make up 27.6% of the population, while adults (20–64 years old) make up 58.5% and seniors (over 64 years old) make up 13.9%.
, there were 635 people who were single and never married in the municipality. There were 746 married individuals, 81 widows or widowers and 57 individuals who are divorced.
, there were 593 private households in the municipality, and an average of 2.5 persons per household. There were 169 households that consist of only one person and 51 households with five or more people. , a total of 560 apartments (57.1% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 392 apartments (40.0%) were seasonally occupied and 28 apartments (2.9%) were empty. , the construction rate of new housing units was 9.1 new units per 1000 residents. The vacancy rate for the municipality, , was 4.87%.
The historical population is given in the following chart:
Heritage sites of national significance
The Fortifications and Bayard Tower are listed as Swiss heritage site of national significanceSwiss 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...
. The entire town of Saillon is part of the Inventory of Swiss Heritage Sites
Inventory of Swiss Heritage Sites
The Inventory of Swiss Heritage Sites is part of a 1981 Ordinance of the Swiss Federal Council implementing the Federal Law on the Protection of Nature and Cultural Heritage.-Sites of national importance:-Types:...
.
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 42.17% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were 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....
(20.15%), 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...
(17.88%) and the SP
Social Democratic Party of Switzerland
The Social Democratic Party of Switzerland is the largest centre-left political party in Switzerland....
(10.68%). In the federal election, a total of 710 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 60.6%.
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 695 votes were cast, of which 60 or about 8.6% were invalid. The voter participation was 55.8%, 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 704 votes were cast, of which 37 or about 5.3% were invalid. The voter participation was 60.4%, which is similar to the cantonal average of 59.88%.
Economy
, Saillon had an unemployment rate of 6.1%. , there were 136 people employed in the primary economic sector and about 53 businesses involved in this sector. 101 people were employed in the secondary sector and there were 15 businesses in this sector. 368 people were employed in the tertiary sector, with 51 businesses in this sector. There were 777 residents of the municipality who were employed in some capacity, of which females made up 44.3% 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 441. The number of jobs in the primary sector was 95, all of which were in agriculture. The number of jobs in the secondary sector was 95 of which 16 or (16.8%) were in manufacturing and 39 (41.1%) were in construction. The number of jobs in the tertiary sector was 251. In the tertiary sector; 60 or 23.9% were in the sale or repair of motor vehicles, 5 or 2.0% were in the movement and storage of goods, 45 or 17.9% were in a hotel or restaurant, 6 or 2.4% were in the information industry, 4 or 1.6% were the insurance or financial industry, 4 or 1.6% were technical professionals or scientists, and 31 or 12.4% were in health care.
, there were 216 workers who commuted into the municipality and 433 workers who commuted away. The municipality is a net exporter of workers, with about 2.0 workers leaving the municipality for every one entering. Of the working population, 6% used public transportation to get to work, and 72.7% used a private car.
Religion
From the , 1,267 or 83.4% were Roman Catholic, while 88 or 5.8% 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 2 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 0.13% of the population), and there were 26 individuals (or about 1.71% of the population) who belonged to another Christian church. There were 7 (or about 0.46% 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 2 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...
and 7 individuals who belonged to another church. 60 (or about 3.95% 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 72 individuals (or about 4.74% of the population) did not answer the question.
Education
In Saillon about 444 or (29.2%) of the population have completed non-mandatory upper secondary education, and 172 or (11.3%) 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 172 who completed tertiary schooling, 61.0% were Swiss men, 22.7% were Swiss women, 8.7% were non-Swiss men and 7.6% were non-Swiss women.
, there were 2 students in Saillon who came from another municipality, while 177 residents attended schools outside the municipality.
Saillon is home to the Bibliothèque communale et scolaire library. The library has 8,928 books or other media, and loaned out 8,093 items in the same year. It was open a total of 147 days with average of 6 hours per week during that year.