Bratsch
Encyclopedia
Bratsch is a village in 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 Gampel-Bratsch
Gampel-Bratsch
Gampel-Bratsch is a municipality in the district of Leuk in the canton of Valais in Switzerland. It was formed on January 1, 2009. The voters of the municipalities of Gampel and Bratsch decided to merge on January 20, 2008.-History:...

 in the district of Leuk 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....

.

Bratsch was an independent municipality until January 1, 2009, when it merged with Gampel
Gampel
Gampel is a former municipality in the district of Leuk in the canton of Valais in Switzerland.It was an independent municipality until January 1, 2009, when it merged with Bratsch to form Gampel-Bratsch.-Coat of arms:...

 to form Gampel-Bratsch
Gampel-Bratsch
Gampel-Bratsch is a municipality in the district of Leuk in the canton of Valais in Switzerland. It was formed on January 1, 2009. The voters of the municipalities of Gampel and Bratsch decided to merge on January 20, 2008.-History:...

.

History

Bratsch is first mentioned in 1228 and 1242 as Praes. In 1309 it was mentioned as Prahcs, in 1322 as Praes, in 1357 as Prayes, in 1408 as Prages and in 1532 as Bratsch.

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 village 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 In azure on a church in argent with a cross of the same, covered with sable, placed in sinister on a mountain entailed in vert and in dexter on a mullet in or, in the point a wavy device (river) in argent surmounting on the mountains.

Demographics

Bratsch has a population of 490.

Most of the population speaks 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....

 (460 or 99.1%) as their first language, Russian
Russian language
Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics...

 is the second most common (2 or 0.4%) and 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...

 is the third (1 or 0.2%). There is 1 person who speaks Romansh.

Of the population in the village 291 or about 62.7% were born in Bratsch and lived there in 2000. There were 154 or 33.2% who were born in the same canton, while 10 or 2.2% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 5 or 1.1% were born outside of Switzerland. , there were 179 people who were single and never married in the village. There were 254 married individuals, 26 widows or widowers and 5 individuals who are divorced.

There were 54 households that consist of only one person and 7 households with five or more people. Out of a total of 196 households that answered this question, 27.6% were households made up of just one person and there was 1 adult who lived with their parents. Of the rest of the households, there are 53 married couples without children, 69 married couples with children There were 9 single parents with a child or children. There were 5 households that were made up of unrelated people and 5 households that were made up of some sort of institution or another collective housing.

there were 163 single family homes (or 69.7% of the total) out of a total of 234 inhabited buildings. There were 55 multi-family buildings (23.5%), along with 11 multi-purpose buildings that were mostly used for housing (4.7%) and 5 other use buildings (commercial or industrial) that also had some housing (2.1%).

, a total of 187 apartments (57.9% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 107 apartments (33.1%) were seasonally occupied and 29 apartments (9.0%) were empty.

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 67.19% 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...

 (17.67%), the SP
Social Democratic Party of Switzerland
The Social Democratic Party of Switzerland is the largest centre-left political party in Switzerland....

 (12.71%) 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....

 (1.22%). In the federal election, a total of 315 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 75.0%.

Economy

, Bratsch had an unemployment rate of 0%. , there were people employed in the primary economic sector and about businesses involved in this sector. No one was employed in the secondary sector or the tertiary sector. There were 223 residents of the village who were employed in some capacity, of which females made up 37.7% 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 35. The number of jobs in the primary sector was 21, all of which were in agriculture. The number of jobs in the secondary sector was 4, all of which were in manufacturing. The number of jobs in the tertiary sector was 10. In the tertiary sector; 1 was in the sale or repair of motor vehicles, 1 was in the movement and storage of goods, 5 or 50.0% were in a hotel or restaurant, .

, there were 6 workers who commuted into the village and 211 workers who commuted away. The village is a net exporter of workers, with about 35.2 workers leaving the village for every one entering. Of the working population, % used public transportation to get to work, and % used a private car.

Religion

From the , 451 or 97.2% were Roman Catholic, while 10 or 2.2% 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...

. 2 (or about 0.43% 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 1 individuals (or about 0.22% of the population) did not answer the question.

Education

In Bratsch about 167 or (36.0%) of the population have completed non-mandatory upper secondary education, and 22 or (4.7%) 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 22 who completed tertiary schooling, 86.4% were Swiss men, 9.1% were Swiss women.

, there were 64 students from Bratsch who attended schools outside the village.
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