Lauwil

Lauwil is first mentioned in 1194 as Luiwilre. ==Geography==

Lauwil has an area, , of . Of this area, or 47.7% is used for agricultural purposes, while or 49.5% is forested. Of the rest of the land, or 2.5% is settled (buildings or roads), or 0.3% is either rivers or lakes. Of the built up area, housing and buildings made up 1.7% and transportation infrastructure made up 0.7%. Out of the forested land, 46.4% of the total land area is heavily forested and 3.2% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 0.8% is used for growing crops and 25.6% is pastures, while 2.8% is used for orchards or vine crops and 18.6% is used for alpine pastures. All of the water in the municipality is flowing water. The municipality is located in the Waldenburg district, in a depression in the Jura Mountains at an elevation of . It consists of the village of Lauwil and the hamlets of Bez. ==Coat of arms==

The blazon of the municipal coat of arms is Argent, Coupeaux Vert incensed Gules. ==Demographics==

Lauwil has a population () of . , 6.2% of the population are resident foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years (1997–2007), the population has changed at a rate of 6.8%. Most of the population () speaks German (305 or 99.3%), with Italian being second most common (1 or 0.3%) and Polish being third (1 or 0.3%). , there were 120 people who were single and never married in the municipality. There were 150 married individuals, 17 widows or widowers, and 20 individuals who were divorced. , there were 124 private households in the municipality, and an average of 2.5 persons per household. , there were 156 apartments in the municipality. The most common apartment size was 4 rooms, of which there were 35. There were 3 single room apartments and 62 apartments with five or more rooms. Of these apartments, a total of 121 apartments (77.6% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 24 apartments (15.4%) were seasonally occupied, and 11 apartments (7.1%) were empty. Colors= id:lightgrey value:gray(0.9) id:darkgrey value:gray(0.8) ImageSize = width:1080 height:210 PlotArea = height:150 left:100 bottom:50 right:100 AlignBars = justify DateFormat = x.y Period = from:0 till:510 TimeAxis = orientation:vertical AlignBars = justify ScaleMajor = gridcolor:darkgrey increment:100 start:0 ScaleMinor = gridcolor:lightgrey increment:20 start:0 PlotData= color:yellowgreen width:40 mark:(line,white) align:center bar:1805 from:start till:306 text:"306" bar:1834 from:start till:400 text:"400" bar:1850 from:start till:508 text:"508" bar:1860 from:start till:489 text:"489" bar:1870 from:start till:441 text:"441" bar:1880 from:start till:424 text:"424" bar:1888 from:start till:467 text:"467" bar:1900 from:start till:449 text:"449" bar:1910 from:start till:448 text:"448" bar:1920 from:start till:427 text:"427" bar:1930 from:start till:364 text:"364" bar:1941 from:start till:342 text:"342" bar:1950 from:start till:330 text:"330" bar:1960 from:start till:340 text:"340" bar:1970 from:start till:307 text:"307" bar:1980 from:start till:287 text:"287" bar:1990 from:start till:291 text:"291" bar:2000 from:start till:307 text:"307" ==Politics==

In the 2007 federal election, the most popular party was the SVP which received 34.18% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the SP (21.71%), the Green Party (17.78%), and the FDP (11.78%). In the federal election, a total of 125 votes were cast, and the voter turnout was 48.8%. ==Economy==

, Lauwil had an unemployment rate of 0.6%. , there were 26 people employed in the primary economic sector and about 11 businesses involved in this sector. 37 people were employed in the secondary sector and there were 5 businesses in this sector. 23 people were employed in the tertiary sector, with 7 businesses in this sector. , there were 23 workers who commuted into the municipality and 104 workers who commuted away. The municipality is a net exporter of workers, with about 4.5 workers leaving the municipality for every one entering. Of the working population, 23% used public transportation to get to work and 47.3% used a private car. ==Religion==

From the , 44 or 14.3% were Roman Catholic, while 211 or 68.7% belonged to the Swiss Reformed Church. Of the rest of the population, there were 7 individuals (or about 2.28% of the population) who belonged to another Christian church. There were 4 (or about 1.30% of the population) who were Islamic. 32 (or about 10.42% of the population) belonged to no church they were agnostic or atheist and 9 individuals (or about 2.93% of the population) did not answer the question. ==Education==

In Lauwil, about 125 (40.7% of the population) have completed non-mandatory upper secondary education, and 28 or (9.1%) have completed additional higher education (either university or a Fachhochschule). Of the 28 who completed tertiary schooling, 71.4% were Swiss men and 21.4% were Swiss women. , there was one student in Lauwil who came from another municipality, while 18 residents attended schools outside the municipality. ==References==