Pfaffnau

Pfaffnau is first mentioned in 924 as Fafanhaa/Fafana. In 1173 it was mentioned as Phafena. ==Geography==

Pfaffnau has an area of . Of this area, or 64.8% is used for agricultural purposes, while or 24.4% is forested. Of the rest of the land, or 9.7% is settled (buildings or roads), or 0.5% is either rivers or lakes and or 0.2% is unproductive land. Of the built up area, housing and buildings made up 5.3% and transportation infrastructure made up 2.6%. Out of the forested land, 23.0% of the total land area is heavily forested and 1.4% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 41.5% is used for growing crops and 21.6% is pastures, while 1.7% is used for orchards or vine crops. All the water in the municipality is flowing water. The municipality is located in the hill country in the north-west corner of the canton, on the border with the cantons of Bern and Aargau. It consists of the former abbey village (Klosterdorf) of Pfaffnau and the hamlets of Burg, Buttenried, Murhof, Nuttele, Sagen, Schuelerslehn and Sankt Urban. ==Demographics==

Pfaffnau has a population () of . , 8.5% of the population are resident foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years (2000–2010) the population has changed at a rate of 0.5%. Migration accounted for 0%, while births and deaths accounted for 1.2%. Most of the population () speaks German (2,247 or 94.0%) as their first language, Serbo-Croatian is the second most common (41 or 1.7%) and Albanian is the third (23 or 1.0%). There are 10 people who speak French, 6 people who speak Italian and 2 people who speak Romansh. Of the population in the municipality, 977 or about 40.9% were born in Pfaffnau and lived there in 2000. There were 585 or 24.5% who were born in the same canton, while 480 or 20.1% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 220 or 9.2% were born outside of Switzerland. , there were 205 households that consist of only one person and 115 households with five or more people. , a total of 763 apartments (86.5% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 74 apartments (8.4%) were seasonally occupied and 45 apartments (5.1%) were empty. , the construction rate of new housing units was 16.4 new units per 1000 residents. Colors= id:lightgrey value:gray(0.9) id:darkgrey value:gray(0.8) ImageSize = width:1080 height:210 PlotArea = top:10 left:100 bottom:50 right:100 AlignBars = justify DateFormat = x.y Period = from:0 till:2700 TimeAxis = orientation:vertical AlignBars = justify ScaleMajor = gridcolor:darkgrey increment:500 start:0 ScaleMinor = gridcolor:lightgrey increment:100 start:0 PlotData= color:yellowgreen width:40 mark:(line,white) align:center bar:1456 from:start till:90 text:"c. 90" bar:1695 from:start till:996 text:"c. 996" bar:1850 from:start till:1885 text:"1,885" bar:1860 from:start till:1907 text:"1,907" bar:1870 from:start till:1771 text:"1,771" bar:1880 from:start till:2059 text:"2,059" bar:1888 from:start till:2023 text:"2,023" bar:1900 from:start till:1954 text:"1,954" bar:1910 from:start till:2121 text:"2,121" bar:1920 from:start till:2182 text:"2,182" bar:1930 from:start till:2265 text:"2,265" bar:1941 from:start till:2407 text:"2,407" bar:1950 from:start till:2523 text:"2,523" bar:1960 from:start till:2575 text:"2,575" bar:1970 from:start till:2584 text:"2,584" bar:1980 from:start till:2453 text:"2,453" bar:1990 from:start till:2601 text:"2,601" bar:2000 from:start till:2390 text:"2,390" ==Heritage sites of national significance==

The Former Monastery of St. Urban, Catholic Parish Church of St. Vinzenz with cemetery chapel and the rectory with tithe barn are listed as Swiss heritage site of national significance. ==Politics==

In the 2011 federal election the most popular party was the CVP which received 40.5% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the SVP (27.3%), the FDP (14%) and the SPS (6.2%). In the federal election, a total of 806 votes were cast, and the voter turnout was 49.9%. ==Economy==

, Pfaffnau had an unemployment rate of 1.61%. , there were a total of 1,319 people employed in the municipality. Of these, there were 204 people employed in the primary economic sector and about 74 businesses involved in this sector. 171 people were employed in the secondary sector and there were 21 businesses in this sector. 944 people were employed in the tertiary sector, with 59 businesses in this sector. , there were 597 workers who commuted into the municipality and 590 workers who commuted away. The municipality is a net importer of workers, with about 1.0 workers entering the municipality for every one leaving. Of the working population, 8.2% used public transportation to get to work, and 53.1% used a private car. ==Religion==

From the , 1,691 or 70.8% were Roman Catholic, while 362 or 15.1% belonged to the Swiss Reformed Church. Of the rest of the population, there were 93 members of an Orthodox church (or about 3.89% of the population), there was 1 individual who belongs to the Christian Catholic Church, and there were 34 individuals (or about 1.42% of the population) who belonged to another Christian church. There was 1 individual who was Jewish, and 61 (or about 2.55% of the population) who were Islamic. There were 11 individuals who were Hindu. 87 (or about 3.64% of the population) belonged to no church, are agnostic or atheist, and 65 individuals (or about 2.72% of the population) did not answer the question. File:Pfaffnau-Pfarrhaus-2.jpg|Pfaffnau, rectory with tithe barn File:Pfaffnau-Pfarrhaus-K.jpg|Pfaffnau, rectory and Chapel of St. Antonius File:Pfaffnau-Pfarrhaus-Kirche.jpg|Pfaffnau, Catholic Parish Church of St. Vinzenz File:Pfaffnau-Kirche-2.jpg|Pfaffnau, Parish Church File:Closter S. Vrban (Merian).jpg|St. Urban's Abbey 1654 File:Pfaffnau-St-Urban-BF.jpg|Former Monastery of St. Urban ==Education==

In Pfaffnau about 797 or (33.3%) of the population have completed non-mandatory upper secondary education, and 214 or (9.0%) have completed additional higher education (either university or a Fachhochschule). Of the 214 who completed tertiary schooling, 71.5% were Swiss men, 19.6% were Swiss women, 6.5% were non-Swiss men and 2.3% were non-Swiss women. ==References==