Meikirch is a municipality in the administrative district of Bern-Mittelland in the canton of Bern in Switzerland.
History
Meikirch is first mentioned in 1208 as Mönchilcha.
Of the built up area, housing and buildings made up 6.2% and transportation infrastructure made up 3.3%. Out of the forested land, nearly all of the forested land area is covered with heavy forests. Of the agricultural land, 47.5% is used for growing crops and 14.6% is pastures, while 1.8% is used for orchards or vine crops.
Demographics
Meikirch has a population () of . , 5.8% of the population are resident foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years (2000–2010) the population has changed at a rate of -5.1%. Migration accounted for -4.9%, while births and deaths accounted for 0.9%.
Most of the population () speaks German (2,368 or 95.4%) as their first language, French is the second most common (24 or 1.0%) and Italian is the third (19 or 0.8%).
, there were 239 households that consist of only one person and 91 households with five or more people. , a total of 958 apartments (94.7% of the total) were permanently occupied, while 33 apartments (3.3%) were seasonally occupied and 21 apartments (2.1%) were empty.
, the construction rate of new housing units was 1.3 new units per 1000 residents. The vacancy rate for the municipality, , was 4.48%.
<timeline>
Colors=
id:lightgrey value:gray(0.9)
id:darkgrey value:gray(0.8)
ImageSize = width:1020 height:210
PlotArea = top:10 left:100 bottom:50 right:100
AlignBars = justify
DateFormat = x.y
Period = from:0 till:2500
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:1764 from:start till:398 text:"398"
bar:1850 from:start till:1059 text:"1,059"
bar:1860 from:start till:1001 text:"1,001"
bar:1870 from:start till:971 text:"971"
bar:1880 from:start till:941 text:"941"
bar:1888 from:start till:979 text:"979"
bar:1900 from:start till:997 text:"997"
bar:1910 from:start till:959 text:"959"
bar:1920 from:start till:858 text:"858"
bar:1930 from:start till:849 text:"849"
bar:1941 from:start till:823 text:"823"
bar:1950 from:start till:949 text:"949"
bar:1960 from:start till:1031 text:"1,031"
bar:1970 from:start till:1405 text:"1,405"
bar:1980 from:start till:1911 text:"1,911"
bar:1990 from:start till:2178 text:"2,178"
bar:2000 from:start till:2482 text:"2,482"
</timeline>
Politics
In the 2011 federal election the most popular party was the SVP which received 24.6% of the vote. The next three most popular parties were the SPS (17.7%), the BDP Party (16.5%) and the Green Party (12.4%). In the federal election, a total of 1,173 votes were cast, and the voter turnout was 62.0%.
Economy
, Meikirch had an unemployment rate of 1.47%. , there were a total of 492 people employed in the municipality. Of these, there were 87 people employed in the primary economic sector and about 29 businesses involved in this sector. 155 people were employed in the secondary sector and there were 26 businesses in this sector. 250 people were employed in the tertiary sector, with 53 businesses in this sector.
, there were 202 workers who commuted into the municipality and 1,031 workers who commuted away. The municipality is a net exporter of workers, with about 5.1 workers leaving the municipality for every one entering. Of the working population, 31.6% used public transportation to get to work, and 47.9% used a private car.
During the 2009–10 school year, there were a total of 214 students attending classes in Meikirch. There were 2 kindergarten classes with a total of 35 students in the municipality. Of the kindergarten students, 11.4% were permanent or temporary residents of Switzerland (not citizens) and 11.4% have a different mother language than the classroom language. The municipality had 6 primary classes and 93 students. Of the primary students, 7.5% were permanent or temporary residents of Switzerland (not citizens) and 5.4% have a different mother language than the classroom language. During the same year, there were 4 lower secondary classes with a total of 81 students. There were 8.6% who were permanent or temporary residents of Switzerland (not citizens) and 4.9% have a different mother language than the classroom language.
, there were 4 students in Meikirch who came from another municipality, while 149 residents attended schools outside the municipality.