Bellach is a

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

in the district of Lebern in the

canton Canton may refer to: Administrative division terminology * Canton (administrative division), territorial/administrative division in some countries, notably Switzerland * Township (Canada), known as ''canton'' in Canadian French Arts and ent ...

Solothurn , neighboring_municipalities = Bellach, Biberist, Feldbrunnen-Sankt Niklaus, Langendorf, Rüttenen, Zuchwil , twintowns = Heilbronn (Germany), Kraków (Poland), Le Landeron (Switzerland) Solothurn ( , ; french: Soleure ; it, Soletta ; ...

in Switzerland.

History

Bellach is first mentioned in 1294 as ''Bella''. In 1307 it was mentioned as ''Bellacho''.

Geography

Bellach has an area, , of . Of this area, or 47.4% is used for agricultural purposes, while or 14.6% is forested. Of the rest of the land, or 33.4% is settled (buildings or roads), or 4.2% is either rivers or lakes and or 0.2% is unproductive land.Swiss Federal Statistical Office-Land Use Statistics
2009 data accessed 25 March 2010 Of the built up area, industrial buildings made up 5.3% of the total area while housing and buildings made up 16.3% and transportation infrastructure made up 9.3%. Power and water infrastructure as well as other special developed areas made up 1.5% of the area Out of the forested land, 12.9% of the total land area is heavily forested and 1.7% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 35.1% is used for growing crops and 10.6% is pastures, while 1.7% is used for orchards or vine crops. Of the water in the municipality, 0.8% is in lakes and 3.4% is in rivers and streams. The municipality is located in the Lebern district, in the southern foothills of the

Jura Mountains The Jura Mountains ( , , , ; french: Massif du Jura; german: Juragebirge; it, Massiccio del Giura, rm, Montagnas da Jura) are a sub-alpine mountain range a short distance north of the Western Alps and mainly demarcate a long part of the Fre ...

, west of

. It consists of the former villages of Ober-Bellach, Nieder-Bellach and Gärisch, which have all grown together. The municipalities of

Biberist Biberist is a municipality in the district of Wasseramt in the canton of Solothurn in Switzerland. History Biberist is first mentioned in 762 as ''Biberussa''. In 1300 Ober- and Unterbiberist were mentioned as ''ze beiden Biberschon''. During t ...

, Derendingen, Luterbach, Bellach, Langendorf and

are considering a merger at a date in the future into the new municipality of with an, , undetermined name.Amtliches Gemeindeverzeichnis der Schweiz
published by the Swiss Federal Statistical Office accessed 17 February 2011 Bellacher Weiher is a pond and nature preserve in the municipality.

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 visua ...

of the municipal

coat of arms A coat of arms is a heraldic visual design on an escutcheon (i.e., shield), surcoat, or tabard (the latter two being outer garments). The coat of arms on an escutcheon forms the central element of the full heraldic achievement, which in it ...

is ''Azure a Horse Argent rampant and harnessed.''

Demographics

Bellach has a population () of . , 26.4% 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 -0.9%.
accessed 29-March-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 **Ger ...

(4,191 or 83.4%), with Italian being second most common (210 or 4.2%) and

Turkish Turkish may refer to: *a Turkic language spoken by the Turks * of or about Turkey ** Turkish language *** Turkish alphabet ** Turkish people, a Turkic ethnic group and nation *** Turkish citizen, a citizen of Turkey *** Turkish communities and mi ...

being third (185 or 3.7%). There are 46 people who speak

French French (french: français(e), link=no) may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to France ** French language, which originated in France, and its various dialects and accents ** French people, a nation and ethnic group identified with Franc ...

and 3 people who speak Romansh. , the gender distribution of the population was 49.8% male and 50.2% female. The population was made up of 1,831 Swiss men (35.7% of the population) and 725 (14.1%) non-Swiss men. There were 1,933 Swiss women (37.7%) and 642 (12.5%) non-Swiss women. Of the population in the municipality 1,236 or about 24.6% were born in Bellach and lived there in 2000. There were 1,534 or 30.5% who were born in the same canton, while 1,083 or 21.5% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 1,061 or 21.1% were born outside of Switzerland. In there were 24 live births to Swiss citizens and 12 births to non-Swiss citizens, and in same time span there were 40 deaths of Swiss citizens and 3 non-Swiss citizen deaths. Ignoring immigration and emigration, the population of Swiss citizens decreased by 16 while the foreign population increased by 9. There were 7 Swiss men who immigrated back to Switzerland and 4 Swiss women who emigrated from Switzerland. At the same time, there were 16 non-Swiss men and 7 non-Swiss women who immigrated from another country to Switzerland. The total Swiss population change in 2008 (from all sources, including moves across municipal borders) was a decrease of 36 and the non-Swiss population decreased by 12 people. This represents a

population growth rate Population growth is the increase in the number of people in a population or dispersed group. Actual global human population growth amounts to around 83 million annually, or 1.1% per year. The global population has grown from 1 billion in 1800 to ...

of -0.9%. The age distribution, , in Bellach is; 370 children or 7.4% of the population are between 0 and 6 years old and 842 teenagers or 16.7% are between 7 and 19. Of the adult population, 264 people or 5.3% of the population are between 20 and 24 years old. 1,469 people or 29.2% are between 25 and 44, and 1,339 people or 26.6% are between 45 and 64. The senior population distribution is 598 people or 11.9% of the population are between 65 and 79 years old and there are 145 people or 2.9% who are over 80. , there were 1,913 people who were single and never married in the municipality. There were 2,566 married individuals, 272 widows or widowers and 276 individuals who are divorced.STAT-TAB Datenwürfel für Thema 40.3 - 2000
accessed 2 February 2011 , there were 2,092 private households in the municipality, and an average of 2.4 persons per household. There were 611 households that consist of only one person and 134 households with five or more people. Out of a total of 2,116 households that answered this question, 28.9% were households made up of just one person and there were 16 adults who lived with their parents. Of the rest of the households, there are 656 married couples without children, 685 married couples with children There were 106 single parents with a child or children. There were 18 households that were made up of unrelated people and 24 households that were made up of some sort of institution or another collective housing. there were 689 single family homes (or 68.4% of the total) out of a total of 1,007 inhabited buildings. There were 184 multi-family buildings (18.3%), along with 81 multi-purpose buildings that were mostly used for housing (8.0%) and 53 other use buildings (commercial or industrial) that also had some housing (5.3%). Of the single family homes 20 were built before 1919, while 98 were built between 1990 and 2000. The greatest number of single family homes (146) were built between 1971 and 1980.Federal Statistical Office STAT-TAB - Datenwürfel für Thema 09.2 - Gebäude und Wohnungen
accessed 28 January 2011 there were 2,322 apartments in the municipality. The most common apartment size was 4 rooms of which there were 828. There were 38 single room apartments and 678 apartments with five or more rooms. Of these apartments, a total of 2,075 apartments (89.4% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 101 apartments (4.3%) were seasonally occupied and 146 apartments (6.3%) were empty. , the construction rate of new housing units was 3.9 new units per 1000 residents. The vacancy rate for the municipality, , was 1.89%. The historical population is given in the following chart: Colors= id:lightgrey value:gray(0.9) id:darkgrey value:gray(0.8) ImageSize = width:1140 height:210 PlotArea = height:150 left:100 bottom:50 right:100 AlignBars = justify DateFormat = x.y Period = from:0 till:5100 TimeAxis = orientation:vertical AlignBars = justify ScaleMajor = gridcolor:darkgrey increment:1000 start:0 ScaleMinor = gridcolor:lightgrey increment:200 start:0 PlotData= color:yellowgreen width:40 mark:(line,white) align:center bar:1518 from:start till:140 bar:1518 at:150 fontsize:S text: " c. 35 Hearths" shift:(8,5) bar:1729 from:start till:59 text:"59" bar:1808 from:start till:459 text:"459" bar:1850 from:start till:686 text:"686" bar:1860 from:start till:629 text:"629" bar:1870 from:start till:697 text:"697" bar:1880 from:start till:736 text:"736" bar:1888 from:start till:803 text:"803" bar:1900 from:start till:964 text:"964" bar:1910 from:start till:1063 text:"1,063" bar:1920 from:start till:1138 text:"1,138" bar:1930 from:start till:1289 text:"1,289" bar:1941 from:start till:1377 text:"1,377" bar:1950 from:start till:1606 text:"1,606" bar:1960 from:start till:2319 text:"2,319" bar:1970 from:start till:3871 text:"3,871" bar:1980 from:start till:4361 text:"4,361" bar:1990 from:start till:5079 text:"5,079" bar:2000 from:start till:5027 text:"5,027"

Politics

In the 2007 federal election the most popular party was the SVP which received 31.21% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the FDP (23.29%), the CVP (18.51%) and the SP (17.04%). In the federal election, a total of 1,625 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 Univ ...

was 50.8%.

Economy

, Bellach had an unemployment rate of 4.6%. , there were 44 people employed in the primary economic sector and about 21 businesses involved in this sector. 1,332 people were employed in the secondary sector and there were 58 businesses in this sector. 851 people were employed in the tertiary sector, with 127 businesses in this sector. There were 2,629 residents of the municipality who were employed in some capacity, of which females made up 42.1% 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 employed person (or student) in a way that makes workloads or class loads comparable across various contexts. FTE is often used to measure a ...

jobs was 1,992. The number of jobs in the primary sector was 27, all of which were in agriculture. The number of jobs in the secondary sector was 1,263 of which 1,120 or (88.7%) were in manufacturing and 141 (11.2%) were in construction. The number of jobs in the tertiary sector was 702. In the tertiary sector; 328 or 46.7% were in wholesale or retail sales or the repair of motor vehicles, 24 or 3.4% were in the movement and storage of goods, 34 or 4.8% were in a hotel or restaurant, 9 or 1.3% were in the information industry, 10 or 1.4% were the insurance or financial industry, 100 or 14.2% were technical professionals or scientists, 43 or 6.1% were in education and 60 or 8.5% were in health care.Swiss Federal Statistica