Dittingen is a municipality in the district of Laufen in the canton of Basel-Country in Switzerland.
History
Dittingen is first mentioned in shortly before 1300 as Tittingen.
Geography
Dittingen has an area, , of . Of this area, or 29.5% is used for agricultural purposes, while or 62.2% is forested. Of the rest of the land, or 7.3% is settled (buildings or roads), or 0.4% is either rivers or lakes and or 0.4% is unproductive land.
Of the built up area, housing and buildings made up 2.2% and transportation infrastructure made up 3.0%. Power and water infrastructure as well as other special developed areas made up 1.2% of the area Out of the forested land, 59.6% of the total land area is heavily forested and 2.7% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 10.2% is used for growing crops and 12.7% is pastures, while 2.4% is used for orchards or vine crops and 4.1% is used for alpine pastures. All the water in the municipality is flowing water.
The municipality is located in the Laufen district, in a side valley off the Birs river valley.
Coat of arms
The blazon of the municipal coat of arms is Argent, a Saint passant robed Sable, haloed and carrying a bag and a staff, and wearing sandals Or, on a Base Vert between two trees of the same trunked Gules.
Demographics
Dittingen has a population () of . , 9.2% of the population are resident foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years (1997–2007) the population has changed at a rate of 1.6%.
Most of the population () speaks German (634 or 92.4%), with Albanian being second most common (15 or 2.2%) and Spanish being third (14 or 2.0%). There are 7 people who speak French and 1 person who speaks Romansh.
, the gender distribution of the population was 48.1% male and 51.9% female. The population was made up of 641 Swiss citizens (89.3% of the population), and 77 non-Swiss residents (10.7%) Of the population in the municipality 270 or about 39.4% were born in Dittingen and lived there in 2000. There were 173 or 25.2% who were born in the same canton, while 158 or 23.0% were born somewhere else in Switzerland, and 71 or 10.3% were born outside of Switzerland.
In there were 5 live births to Swiss citizens and 1 birth to non-Swiss citizens, and in same time span there were 4 deaths of Swiss citizens. Ignoring immigration and emigration, the population of Swiss citizens increased by 1 while the foreign population increased by 1. There were 2 Swiss men and 2 Swiss women who immigrated back to Switzerland. At the same time, there was 1 non-Swiss woman 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 5 and the non-Swiss population remained the same. This represents a population growth rate of -0.7%.
The age distribution, , in Dittingen is; 39 children or 5.4% of the population are between 0 and 6 years old and 103 teenagers or 14.3% are between 7 and 19. Of the adult population, 65 people or 9.1% of the population are between 20 and 29 years old. 101 people or 14.1% are between 30 and 39, 126 people or 17.5% are between 40 and 49, and 135 people or 18.8% are between 50 and 64. The senior population distribution is 120 people or 16.7% of the population are between 65 and 79 years old and there are 29 people or 4.0% who are over 80.
, there were 265 people who were single and never married in the municipality. There were 344 married individuals, 49 widows or widowers and 28 individuals who are divorced.
, there were 298 private households in the municipality, and an average of 2.3 persons per household. There were 87 households that consist of only one person and 17 households with five or more people. Out of a total of 301 households that answered this question, 28.9% were households made up of just one person and 5 were adults who lived with their parents. Of the rest of the households, there are 107 married couples without children, 81 married couples with children There were 16 single parents with a child or children. There were 2 households that were made up unrelated people and 3 households that were made some sort of institution or another collective housing.