Austevoll

Austevoll Municipality Austevoll kommune
Municipality
Flag Coat of arms
Austevoll within Hordaland
Country	Norway
County	Hordaland
District	Midhordland
Administrative centre	Storebø
Government
• Governor (2003)	Helge André Njåstad (Frp)
Area
• Total	117 km2 (45 sq mi)
• Land	114 km2 (44 sq mi)
• Rank	#376 in Norway
Population  (2004)
• Total	4,487
• Rank	#215 in Norway
• Density	39/km2 (100/sq mi)
• Change (10 years)	+6.6%
Official language
• Norwegian form	Nynorsk
Time zone	UTC+01:00 (CET)
• Summer (DST)	UTC+02:00 (CEST)
ISO 3166 code	NO-1244
Website	Official website
Data from Statistics Norway

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Austevoll is a municipality in the county of Hordaland, Norway. The population was 4,391 in january 2006. The municipality consists of several islands, located south-west of Bergen. The municipality is considered to be among the ports in the world with the largest ocean-going fish trawler fleet.

Geography

Austevoll consists of 667 islands off the west coast of West Norway. The municipality has a total land area of 114,0 km² and a costal line of 337 km. The tallest point in Austevoll is the mountain Loddo, 244 meters above sea level.

Largest islands

• Huftarøy
• Selbjørn
• Hundvåkøy
• Stolmen
• Storekalsøy.

Neighbours

The municipality borders to Sund, Bergen and Os municipalities in north and northeast, Tysnes municipality in east, Fitjar and Bømlo municipalities in south. West of Austevoll lies the North Sea.

Demographics

Bekkjarvik is the second largest village in Austevoll, and an important tourist destination.

Of the 667 islands, only eight is populated all year round. 29 percent of the inhabitants live in densed populated areas. 28 percent of the inhabitants are under the age of 17, which is 4,4 percent over the national average. 4,7 percent of the inhabitants are 80 years or older.

Villages

• Storebø, population 1,032
• Bekkjarvik, population 355

Inhabited islands

• Huftarøy
• Selbjørn
• Hundvåkøy
• Stolmen
• Storekalsøy
• Møkster
• Litlekalsøy
• Lundøy

Industry

Fishery is the most important industry in Austevoll, and has been for centuries. Traditionally fishing has taken place in coastal near areas. After decades of overfishing, the herring, which was the most important fish, disappeared in the 1950's. This forced a restructuring of the fishing fleet. From the 1960's the shipping companies built bigger ships, and went further out seas, fishing other fish species. The overfishing of herring also forced better research on fishing, resulting in the Norwegian Institute of Marin Research.

Since the early 1980's the offshore industry has emerged in the prolongation from the offshore Norwegian oil industry. The offshore shipping company DOF, which is enlisted on the Oslo Stock Exchange, has its headquarters at Storebø.

Education

There are five primary schools and one middle school in Austevoll, all municipal. There is also one secondary school, teaching mainly fishing and nautical subjects. This is operated by the county atuhority.

Communication

Austevoll has car ferry communications from Hufthammar on the north tip of Huftarøy to Krokeide, Bergen, and Husavik, south on Huftarøy, to Sandvikvåg in Fitjar. The municipality is also connected by express boats to Bergen in north, and Stord, Haugesund and Stavanger in the south.

The islands Huftarøy and Selbjørn, Selbjørn and Stolmen, and Hundvåkøy and Storekalsøy are connected with bridges. A fourth bridge is under construction, connection Huftarøy and Hundvåkøy. This is bridge, which in fact consists of two bridges and two stone fillings, bears the name of the municipality, "Austevollsbrua", symbolizes that the largest islands in the municipality is connected. The bridge is set to be opened in November 2007.

All ferry and boat routs are operated by Hardanger Sunnhordlandske Dampskipsselskap.

Famous people

• Professional footballer Claus Lundekvam.