Gelterkinden is a municipality in the district of Sissach in the canton of Basel-Country in Switzerland.
History
Gelterkinden is first mentioned between 1101–03 as Gelterkingen.
Geography
Gelterkinden has an area, , of . Of this area, or 34.2% is used for agricultural purposes, while or 47.4% is forested. Of the rest of the land, or 18.2% is settled (buildings or roads), or 0.3% is either rivers or lakes and or 0.2% is unproductive land.
Of the built up area, industrial buildings made up 2.1% of the total area while housing and buildings made up 10.5% and transportation infrastructure made up 4.2%. Out of the forested land, 45.6% of the total land area is heavily forested and 1.8% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 12.7% is used for growing crops and 17.8% is pastures, while 3.8% is used for orchards or vine crops. All the water in the municipality is flowing water.
The municipality is located in the Sissach district. The main village is located in the upper Ergolz valley at the confluence of the Ergolz and Eibach. It consists of the village of Gelterkinden and more than 20 other settlements including Sommerau, which has its own train station.
Coat of arms
The blazon of the municipal coat of arms is Trierced per pale, Azure, Argent and Gules.
Demographics
Gelterkinden has a population () of . , 15.7% of the population are resident foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years (1997–2007) the population has changed at a rate of 5.8%.
Most of the population () speaks German (4,805 or 87.7%), with Italian language being second most common (173 or 3.2%) and Serbo-Croatian being third (120 or 2.2%). There are 47 people who speak French and 4 people who speak Romansh.
, the gender distribution of the population was 48.7% male and 51.3% female. The population was made up of 4,782 Swiss citizens (83.4% of the population), and 954 non-Swiss residents (16.6%) Of the population in the municipality 1,559 or about 28.5% were born in Gelterkinden and lived there in 2000. There were 1,398 or 25.5% who were born in the same canton, while 1,365 or 24.9% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 987 or 18.0% were born outside of Switzerland.
In there were 48 live births to Swiss citizens and 8 births to non-Swiss citizens, and in same time span there were 41 deaths of Swiss citizens and 2 non-Swiss citizen deaths. Ignoring immigration and emigration, the population of Swiss citizens increased by 7 while the foreign population increased by 6. There were 5 Swiss men and 2 Swiss women who immigrated back to Switzerland. At the same time, there were 17 non-Swiss men and 19 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 an increase of 49 and the non-Swiss population increased by 24 people. This represents a population growth rate of 1.3%.
The age distribution, , in Gelterkinden is; 351 children or 6.1% of the population are between 0 and 6 years old and 865 teenagers or 15.1% are between 7 and 19. Of the adult population, 772 people or 13.5% of the population are between 20 and 29 years old. 682 people or 11.9% are between 30 and 39, 863 people or 15.0% are between 40 and 49, and 1,175 people or 20.5% are between 50 and 64. The senior population distribution is 736 people or 12.8% of the population are between 65 and 79 years old and there are 292 people or 5.1% who are over 80.
, there were 2,243 people who were single and never married in the municipality. There were 2,693 married individuals, 316 widows or widowers and 224 individuals who are divorced.
, there were 2,208 private households in the municipality, and an average of 2.4 persons per household. There were 653 households that consist of only one person and 166 households with five or more people. Out of a total of 2,239 households that answered this question, 29.2% were households made up of just one person and 17 were adults who lived with their parents. Of the rest of the households, there are 694 married couples without children, 708 married couples with children There were 114 single parents with a child or children. There were 22 households that were made up unrelated people and 31 households that were made some sort of institution or another collective housing.