Ried-Brig is a

municipality A municipality is usually a single administrative division having corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality'' may also mean the go ...

in the district of

Brig A brig is a type of sailing vessel defined by its rig: two masts which are both square rig, square-rigged. Brigs originated in the second half of the 18th century and were a common type of smaller merchant vessel or warship from then until the ...

in the canton of

Valais Valais ( , , ; frp, Valês; german: Wallis ), more formally the Canton of Valais,; german: Kanton Wallis; in other official Swiss languages outside Valais: it, (Canton) Vallese ; rm, (Chantun) Vallais. is one of the cantons of Switzerland, 26 ...

Switzerland ). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the federal courts, are in other cities (Bellinzona, Lausanne, Luzern, Neuchâtel ...

History

Ried-Brig is first mentioned in 1232 as ''Riet''. In 1428 it was mentioned as ''ried de briga''. Until 1993 it was officially known as ''Ried bei Brig''.

Geography

Ried-Brig has an area, , of . Of this area, 19.0% is used for agricultural purposes, while 30.7% is forested. Of the rest of the land, 2.7% is settled (buildings or roads) and 47.6% is unproductive land. The municipality is located in the Brig district, above

and on the

Simplon Pass The Simplon Pass (french: Col du Simplon; german: Simplonpass; it, Passo del Sempione, Lombard: ''Pass del Sempiün'') () is a high mountain pass between the Pennine Alps and the Lepontine Alps in Switzerland. It connects Brig in the canton of ...

road.

Coat of arms

The

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. The verb ''to blazon'' means to create such a description. The vis ...

of the municipal

coat of arms A coat of arms is a heraldry, heraldic communication design, visual design on an escutcheon (heraldry), escutcheon (i.e., shield), surcoat, or tabard (the latter two being outer garments). The coat of arms on an escutcheon forms the central ele ...

is ''Argent, issuant from Coupeaux Vert three Pine-trees Vert trunked proper.''

Demographics

Ried-Brig has a population () of . , 6.1% of the population are resident foreign nationals.Swiss Federal Statistical Office - Superweb database - Gemeinde Statistics 1981-2008
accessed 19 June 2010 Over the last 10 years (1999–2009 ) the population has changed at a rate of 3.4%. It has changed at a rate of 5.3% due to migration and at a rate of 3.8% due to births and deaths.
accessed 28-August-2011 Most of the population () speaks

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) ** Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ge ...

(1,519 or 96.0%) as their first language, French is the second most common (21 or 1.3%) and

Italian Italian(s) may refer to: * Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries ** Italians, an ethnic group or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom ** Italian language, a Romance language *** Regional Ita ...

is the third (13 or 0.8%). There is 1 person who speaks Romansh. , the gender distribution of the population was 50.6% male and 49.4% female. The population was made up of 833 Swiss men (47.5% of the population) and 54 (3.1%) non-Swiss men. There were 818 Swiss women (46.7%) and 48 (2.7%) non-Swiss women.Ständige Wohnbevolkerung nach Geschlecht und Heimat am 31.12.2009.xls
accessed 24 August 2011 Of the population in the municipality 701 or about 44.3% were born in Ried-Brig and lived there in 2000. There were 578 or 36.5% who were born in the same canton, while 192 or 12.1% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 87 or 5.5% were born outside of Switzerland. The age distribution of the population () is children and teenagers (0–19 years old) make up 29.2% of the population, while adults (20–64 years old) make up 61.1% and seniors (over 64 years old) make up 9.7%. , there were 707 people who were single and never married in the municipality. There were 778 married individuals, 63 widows or widowers and 34 individuals who are divorced.STAT-TAB Datenwürfel für Thema 40.3 - 2000
accessed 2 February 2011 , there were 562 private households in the municipality, and an average of 2.7 persons per household. There were 121 households that consist of only one person and 64 households with five or more people. Out of a total of 568 households that answered this question, 21.3% were households made up of just one person and there were 7 adults who lived with their parents. Of the rest of the households, there are 147 married couples without children, 254 married couples with children There were 29 single parents with a child or children. There were 4 households that were made up of unrelated people and 6 households that were made up of some sort of institution or another collective housing. there were 294 single family homes (or 67.0% of the total) out of a total of 439 inhabited buildings. There were 114 multi-family buildings (26.0%), along with 12 multi-purpose buildings that were mostly used for housing (2.7%) and 19 other use buildings (commercial or industrial) that also had some housing (4.3%).Swiss Federal Statistical Office STAT-TAB - Datenwürfel für Thema 09.2 - Gebäude und Wohnungen
accessed 28 January 2011 , a total of 538 apartments (78.2% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 136 apartments (19.8%) were seasonally occupied and 14 apartments (2.0%) were empty. , the construction rate of new housing units was 12.5 new units per 1000 residents. The vacancy rate for the municipality, , was 1.67%. The historical population is given in the following chart: Colors= id:lightgrey value:gray(0.9) id:darkgrey value:gray(0.8) ImageSize = width:960 height:210 PlotArea = height:150 left:100 bottom:50 right:100 AlignBars = justify DateFormat = x.y Period = from:0 till:1600 TimeAxis = orientation:vertical AlignBars = justify ScaleMajor = gridcolor:darkgrey increment:300 start:0 ScaleMinor = gridcolor:lightgrey increment:60 start:0 PlotData= color:yellowgreen width:40 mark:(line,white) align:center bar:1850 from:start till:506 text:"506" bar:1860 from:start till:646 text:"646" bar:1870 from:start till:607 text:"607" bar:1880 from:start till:619 text:"619" bar:1888 from:start till:623 text:"623" bar:1900 from:start till:700 text:"700" bar:1910 from:start till:622 text:"622" bar:1920 from:start till:667 text:"667" bar:1930 from:start till:760 text:"760" bar:1941 from:start till:766 text:"766" bar:1950 from:start till:739 text:"739" bar:1960 from:start till:768 text:"768" bar:1970 from:start till:879 text:"879" bar:1980 from:start till:1168 text:"1,168" bar:1990 from:start till:1423 text:"1,423" bar:2000 from:start till:1582 text:"1,582"

Politics

In the 2007 federal election the most popular party was the CVP which received 65.45% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the SP (14.89%), the SVP (13.08%) and the FDP (4.1%). In the federal election, a total of 911 votes were cast, and the

voter turnout In political science, voter turnout is the participation rate (often defined as those who cast a ballot) of a given election. This can be the percentage of registered voters, eligible voters, or all voting-age people. According to Stanford Unive ...

was 65.3%. In the 2009 Conseil d'État/Staatsrat election a total of 887 votes were cast, of which 49 or about 5.5% were invalid. The voter participation was 65.3%, which is much more than the cantonal average of 54.67%. In the 2007 Swiss Council of States election a total of 909 votes were cast, of which 25 or about 2.8% were invalid. The voter participation was 65.5%, which is much more than the cantonal average of 59.88%.

Economy

, Ried-Brig had an unemployment rate of 1.3%. , there were 73 people employed in the primary economic sector and about 34 businesses involved in this sector. 79 people were employed in the

secondary sector In macroeconomics, the secondary sector of the economy is an economic sector in the three-sector theory that describes the role of manufacturing. It encompasses industries that produce a finished, usable product or are involved in construction. ...

and there were 18 businesses in this sector. 158 people were employed in the

tertiary sector The tertiary sector of the economy, generally known as the service sector, is the third of the three economic sectors in the three-sector model (also known as the economic cycle). The others are the primary sector (raw materials) and the second ...

, with 43 businesses in this sector. There were 746 residents of the municipality who were employed in some capacity, of which females made up 36.6% of the workforce. the total number of

full-time equivalent Full-time equivalent (FTE), or whole time equivalent (WTE), is a unit that indicates the workload of an employee, employed person (or student) in a way that makes workloads or class loads comparable across various contexts. FTE is often used to me ...

jobs was 234. The number of jobs in the primary sector was 40, of which 29 were in agriculture and 11 were in forestry or lumber production. The number of jobs in the secondary sector was 70 of which 21 or (30.0%) were in manufacturing and 49 (70.0%) were in construction. The number of jobs in the tertiary sector was 124. In the tertiary sector; 15 or 12.1% were in wholesale or retail sales or the repair of motor vehicles, 13 or 10.5% were in the movement and storage of goods, 30 or 24.2% were in a hotel or restaurant, 1 was in the information industry, 4 or 3.2% were the insurance or financial industry, 3 or 2.4% were technical professionals or scientists, 7 or 5.6% were in education and 38 or 30.6% were in health care. , there were 75 workers who commuted into the municipality and 598 workers who commuted away. The municipality is a net exporter of workers, with about 8.0 workers leaving the municipality for every one entering. About 5.3% of the workforce coming into Ried-Brig are coming from outside Switzerland.Swiss Federal Statistical Office - Statweb
accessed 24 June 2010 Of the working population, 25.3% used public transportation to get to work, and 59.1% used a private car.

Religion

From the , 1,391 or 87.9% were

Roman Catholic Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lette ...

, while 85 or 5.4% belonged to the

Swiss Reformed Church The Protestant Church in Switzerland (PCS), (EKS); french: Église évangélique réformée de Suisse (EERS); it, Chiesa evangelica riformata in Svizzera (CERiS); rm, Baselgia evangelica refurmada da la Svizra (BRRS) formerly named Federation o ...

. Of the rest of the population, there were 6 members of an Orthodox church (or about 0.38% of the population), and there were 27 individuals (or about 1.71% of the population) who belonged to another Christian church. There were 7 (or about 0.44% of the population) who were

Islam Islam (; ar, ۘالِإسلَام, , ) is an Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic Monotheism#Islam, monotheistic religion centred primarily around the Quran, a religious text considered by Muslims to be the direct word of God in Islam, God (or ...

ic. There was 1 person who was

Buddhist Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and ...

. 44 (or about 2.78% of the population) belonged to no church, are

agnostic Agnosticism is the view or belief that the existence of God, of the divine or the supernatural is unknown or unknowable. (page 56 in 1967 edition) Another definition provided is the view that "human reason is incapable of providing sufficient ...

atheist Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there no ...

, and 34 individuals (or about 2.15% of the population) did not answer the question.

Education

In Ried-Brig about 631 or (39.9%) of the population have completed non-mandatory upper secondary education, and 165 or (10.4%) have completed additional higher education (either

university A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, t ...

or a ''

Fachhochschule A ''Fachhochschule'' (; plural ''Fachhochschulen''), abbreviated FH, is a university of applied sciences (UAS), in other words a German tertiary education institution that provides professional education in many applied sciences and applied arts ...

''). Of the 165 who completed tertiary schooling, 72.1% were Swiss men, 18.2% were Swiss women, 5.5% were non-Swiss men and 4.2% were non-Swiss women. During the 2010-2011 school year there were a total of 155 students in the Ried-Brig school system. The

education system The educational system generally refers to the structure of all institutions and the opportunities for obtaining education within a country. It includes all pre-school institutions, starting from family education, and/or early childhood education ...

in the Canton of Valais allows young children to attend one year of non-obligatory

Kindergarten Kindergarten is a preschool educational approach based on playing, singing, practical activities such as drawing, and social interaction as part of the transition from home to school. Such institutions were originally made in the late 18th cent ...

. During that school year, there 2 kindergarten classes (KG1 or KG2) and 37 kindergarten students. The canton's school system requires students to attend six years of

primary school A primary school (in Ireland, the United Kingdom, Australia, Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica, and South Africa), junior school (in Australia), elementary school or grade school (in North America and the Philippines) is a school for primary e ...

. In Ried-Brig there were a total of 8 classes and 155 students in the primary school. The

secondary school A secondary school describes an institution that provides secondary education and also usually includes the building where this takes place. Some secondary schools provide both '' secondary education, lower secondary education'' (ages 11 to 14) ...

program consists of three lower, obligatory years of schooling (orientation classes), followed by three to five years of optional, advanced schools. All the lower secondary students from Ried-Brig attend their school in a neighboring municipality.Obligatorische Schulzeit
accessed 24 August 2011 All the upper secondary students attended school in another municipality. , there were 8 students in Ried-Brig who came from another municipality, while 149 residents attended schools outside the municipality.

References

External links

Official website
{{Authority control Municipalities of Valais