Ferden

Ferden is a municipality in the district of Raron in the canton of Valais in Switzerland. Besides the village of Ferden itself, the municipality includes the hamlet of Goppenstein, and the alpine settlements of Faldum, Resti and Kummen. Ferden is first mentioned in 1380 as Verdan. Ferden has an area, , of . Of this area, or 17.7% is used for agricultural purposes, while or 19.3% is forested. Of the rest of the land, or 0.8% is settled (buildings or roads), or 1.1% is either rivers or lakes and or 61.1% is unproductive land. Of the built up area, housing and buildings made up 0.2% and transportation infrastructure made up 0.5%. Out of the forested land, 14.4% of the total land area is heavily forested and 2.6% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 1.3% is pastures and 16.4% is used for alpine pastures. Of the water in the municipality, 0.4% is in lakes and 0.8% is in rivers and streams. Of the unproductive areas, 17.5% is unproductive vegetation, 41.8% is too rocky for vegetation and 1.8% of the land is covered by glaciers. The municipality is located in the Westlich Raron district. It is at the bottom of the Lötschen valley at an elevation of . It consists of the haufendorf village (an irregular, unplanned and quite closely packed village, built around a central square) of Ferden, the hamlet of Goppenstein, and the alpine settlements of Faldum, Resti and Kummen. Stausee Ferden is a reservoir on the Lonza River. The blazon of the municipal coat of arms is Per fess by a bar wavy Argent, in chief Gules a Cross bottony Argent and in base Vert the Host Argent radiating Or issuant from a Cup Or. Ferden has a population () of . , 1.1% of the population are resident foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years (2000–2010 ) the population has changed at a rate of -17.9%. It has changed at a rate of -5.3% due to migration and at a rate of -6.3% due to births and deaths. Most of the population () speaks German (280 or 97.9%) as their first language, Italian is the second most common (4 or 1.