Miège

Miège () is a former municipality in the district of Sierre in the canton of Valais in Switzerland. On 1 January 2021 the former municipalities of Miège, Venthône and Veyras merged to form the new municipality of Noble-Contrée.

History

Miège is first mentioned in 1226 as ''Mieio''. The municipality was formerly known by its German name ''Miesen'', however, that name is no longer used.

Geography

Miège had an area, , of . Of this area, or 44.7% is used for agricultural purposes, while or 36.8% is forested. Of the rest of the land, or 17.0% is settled (buildings or roads), or 0.4% is either rivers or lakes and or 1.6% is unproductive land.Swiss Federal Statistical Office-Land Use Statistics
2009 data accessed 25 March 2010

Of the built up area, housing and buildings made up 6.7% and transportation infrastructure made up 8.3%. while parks, green belts and sports fields made up 1.6%. Out of the forested land, 34.0% of the total land area is heavily forested and 2.8% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 0.0% is used for growing crops and 4.3% is pastures, while 40.3% is used for orchards or vine crops. All the water in the municipality is flowing water.

The former municipality is located in the Sierre district, in the vineyards on the right bank of the Rhone. It is west of the Raspille river, which is the border with the German speaking Upper Valais. It consists of the ''haufendorf'' village (an irregular, unplanned and quite closely packed village, built around a central square) of Miège.

Coat of arms

The blazon of the municipal coat of arms is ''Gules, issuant from Coupeaux Vert a Garb Or between two vines of the second fructed of the third, in chief a Sun in Splendour of the last.''

Demographics

Miège had a population (as of 2019) of 1,376. , 12.7% 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 (2000–2010 ) the population has changed at a rate of 31.1%. It has changed at a rate of 20.9% due to migration and at a rate of 7.2% due to births and deaths.
accessed 23-September-2011

Most of the population () speaks French (782 or 85.7%) as their first language, German is the second most common (80 or 8.8%) and Serbo-Croatian is the third (14 or 1.5%). There are 11 people who speak Italian.

, the population was 46.1% male and 53.9% female. The population was made up of 472 Swiss men (39.4% of the population) and 80 (6.7%) non-Swiss men. There were 568 Swiss women (47.4%) and 78 (6.5%) non-Swiss women.Ständige Wohnbevolkerung nach Geschlecht und Heimat am 31.12.2009.xls
accessed 24 August 2011 Of the population in the municipality, 390 or about 42.7% were born in Miège and lived there in 2000. There were 282 or 30.9% who were born in the same canton, while 101 or 11.1% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 104 or 11.4% were born outside of Switzerland.

, children and teenagers (0–19 years old) make up 25.5% of the population, while adults (20–64 years old) make up 59.9% and seniors (over 64 years old) make up 14.6%.

, there were 365 people who were single and never married in the municipality. There were 465 married individuals, 50 widows or widowers and 33 individuals who are divorced.STAT-TAB Datenwürfel für Thema 40.3 - 2000
accessed 2 February 2011

, there were 359 private households in the municipality, and an average of 2.5 persons per household. There were 102 households that consist of only one person and 33 households with five or more people. , a total of 335 apartments (87.9% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 34 apartments (8.9%) were seasonally occupied and 12 apartments (3.1%) were empty.Swiss Federal Statistical Office STAT-TAB - Datenwürfel für Thema 09.2 - Gebäude und Wohnungen
accessed 28 January 2011 , the construction rate of new housing units was 3.3 new units per 1000 residents. The vacancy rate for the municipality, , was 1.39%.

The historical population is given in the following chart:

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bar:1850 from:start till:283 text:"283"
bar:1860 from:start till:296 text:"296"
bar:1870 from:start till:325 text:"325"
bar:1880 from:start till:326 text:"326"
bar:1888 from:start till:377 text:"377"
bar:1900 from:start till:438 text:"438"
bar:1910 from:start till:462 text:"462"
bar:1920 from:start till:436 text:"436"
bar:1930 from:start till:499 text:"499"
bar:1941 from:start till:569 text:"569"
bar:1950 from:start till:591 text:"591"
bar:1960 from:start till:560 text:"560"
bar:1970 from:start till:614 text:"614"
bar:1980 from:start till:653 text:"653"
bar:1990 from:start till:828 text:"828"
bar:2000 from:start till:913 text:"913"

Politics

In the 2007 federal election the most popular party was the CVP which received 37.08% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the SP (18.44%), the FDP (17.7%) and the SVP (12.04%). In the federal election, a total of 457 votes were cast, and the voter turnout was 60.1%.

In the 2009 Conseil d'État/Staatsrat election a total of 503 votes were cast, of which 33 or about 6.6% were invalid. The voter participation was 63.8%, which is much more than the cantonal average of 54.67%. In the 2007 Swiss Council of States election a total of 451 votes were cast, of which 26 or about 5.8% were invalid. The voter participation was 59.7%, which is similar to the cantonal average of 59.88%.

Economy

, Miège had an unemployment rate of 4.6%. , there were 85 people employed in the primary economic sector and about 51 businesses involved in this sector. 56 people were employed in the secondary sector and there were 9 businesses in this sector. 72 people were employed in the tertiary sector, with 17 businesses in this sector. There were 432 residents of the municipality who were employed in some capacity, of which females made up 42.6% of the workforce.

the total number of full-time equivalent jobs was 137. The number of jobs in the primary sector was 40, all of which were in agriculture. The number of jobs in the secondary sector was 51 of which 10 or (19.6%) were in manufacturing and 40 (78.4%) were in construction. The number of jobs in the tertiary sector was 46. In the tertiary sector; 14 or 30.4% were in wholesale or retail sales or the repair of motor vehicles, 2 or 4.3% were in the movement and storage of goods, 4 or 8.7% were the insurance or financial industry, 4 or 8.7% were technical professionals or scientists, 14 or 30.4% were in education and 1 was in health care.Swiss Federal Statistical Office STAT-TAB Betriebszählung: Arbeitsstätten nach Gemeinde und NOGA 2008 (Abschnitte), Sektoren 1-3
accessed 28 January 2011

, there were 31 workers who commuted into the municipality and 319 workers who commuted away. The municipality is a net exporter of workers, with about 10.3 workers leaving the municipality for every one entering.Swiss Federal Statistical Office - Statweb
accessed 24 June 2010 Of the working population, 4.9% used public transportation to get to work, and 76.2% used a private car.

Religion

From the , 737 or 80.7% were Roman Catholic, while 45 or 4.9% belonged to the Swiss Reformed Church. Of the rest of the population, there were 15 members of an Orthodox church (or about 1.64% of the population), and there were 50 individuals (or about 5.48% of the population) who belonged to another Christian church. There was 1 individual who was Islamic. There was 1 person who was Buddhist, 4 individuals who were Hindu and 8 individuals who belonged to another church. 39 (or about 4.27% of the population) belonged to no church, are agnostic or atheist, and 38 individuals (or about 4.16% of the population) did not answer the question.

Education

In Miège about 328 or (35.9%) of the population have completed non-mandatory upper secondary education, and 105 or (11.5%) have completed additional higher education (either university or a ''Fachhochschule''). Of the 105 who completed tertiary schooling, 58.1% were Swiss men, 26.7% were Swiss women, 6.7% were non-Swiss men and 8.6% were non-Swiss women.

, there were 7 students in Miège who came from another municipality, while 76 residents attended schools outside the municipality.

References

External links

Official website

{{DEFAULTSORT:Miege
Former municipalities of Valais