they physically grew together. In 1936 the watch parts manufacturer Société industrielle de Sonceboz built a factory in the village. In 1978, the flooring manufacturer Bienna SA built a factory in the municipality, which strengthened the industrial sector. By 2005, over two-thirds of the jobs in the municipality are manufacturing. Geography Sonceboz-Sombeval has an area of . Of this area, or 33.3% is used for agricultural purposes, while or 58.4% is forested. Of the rest of the land, or 7.5% is settled (buildings or roads), or 0.5% is either rivers or lakes and or 0.3% is unproductive land. Of the built up area, housing and buildings made up 2.9% and transportation infrastructure made up 3.7%. Out of the forested land, 55.8% of the total land area is heavily forested and 2.6% is covered with orchards or small clusters of trees. Of the agricultural land, 7.5% is used for growing crops and 14.4% is pastures and 11.3% is used for alpine pastures. All the water in the municipality is flowing water. The municipality is located in the Saint-Imier valley at the foot of the historic Pierre Pertuis pass. It consists of the villages of Sonceboz and Sombeval which have grown together. On 31 December 2009 District de Courtelary, the municipality's former district, was dissolved. On the following day, 1 January 2010, it joined the newly created Arrondissement administratif Jura bernois. Coat of arms The blazon of the municipal coat of arms is Argent three Fir Trees Vert trunked Gules issuant from a Mount of 3 Coupeaux of the second and in chief two Mullets of Five of the third. Demographics Sonceboz-Sombeval has a population () of . , 15.3% of the population are resident foreign nationals. Over the last 10 years (2000-2010) the population has changed at a rate of 5.4%. Migration accounted for 0.7%, while births and deaths accounted for 3.6%. Most of the population () speaks French (1,358 or 81.5%) as their first language, German is the second most common (202 or 12.1%) and Italian is the third (53 or 3.2%). There is 1 person who speaks Romansh. , the population was 50.6% male and 49.4% female. The population was made up of 746 Swiss men (41.9% of the population) and 155 (8.7%) non-Swiss men. There were 761 Swiss women (42.8%) and 117 (6.6%) non-Swiss women. Of the population in the municipality, 511 or about 30.7% were born in