| Olofström Municipality | |
| Native Name: | Olofströms kommun |
| Native Name Lang: | sv |
| Settlement Type: | Municipality |
| Coordinates: | 56.2667°N 46°W |
| Subdivision Type: | Country |
| Subdivision Name: | Sweden |
| Subdivision Type1: | County |
| Subdivision Name1: | Blekinge County |
| Seat Type: | Seat |
| Seat: | Olofström |
| Unit Pref: | Metric |
| Area Note: | Area as of . |
| Population Density Km2: | auto |
| Timezone1: | CET |
| Utc Offset1: | +1 |
| Timezone1 Dst: | CEST |
| Utc Offset1 Dst: | +2 |
| Blank Name Sec1: | Province |
| Blank Info Sec1: | Blekinge |
| Blank1 Name Sec1: | Municipal code |
| Blank1 Info Sec1: | 1060 |
| Iso Code: | SE |
| Website: | www.olofstrom.se |
Olofström Municipality (Swedish: Olofströms kommun) is the only landlocked municipality in Blekinge County, South Sweden. It borders to Osby Municipality, Kristianstad Municipality, Bromölla Municipality, Sölvesborg Municipality, Karlshamn Municipality, Tingsryd Municipality, and Älmhult Municipality. The town of Olofström is the seat of the municipality.
The amalgamation of the former units in this area took place in 1967 when the market town Olofström (itself detached from Jämshög in 1941) was merged with Kyrkhult and Jämshög.
Notable person that Olofström counts as theirs is Nobel Prize winning author Harry Martinson (1904-1978; prize in 1974) who was born in Jämshög within the municipality.
The municipality is covered with forests and lakes. It labels itself "The southernmost wildlife in Sweden", probably because there are scarcely any forests or lakes south of the Blekinge province.
The highest point in the province and county of Blekinge, Rävabacken (189,65 m), is located in the northern part of the municipality.
There are 5 localities classified as urban areas (tätort in Swedish) in Olofström Municipality. In addition to that, there is one more recognized locality.
In the table the urban areas and localities are listed according to the size of the population as of December 31, 2006.[1] The municipal seat is in bold characters.
| Locality | Population | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Olofström | 7,425 | |
| 2 | 1,605 | ||
| 3 | 1,016 | ||
| 4 | 327 | ||
| 5 | 208 | ||
| 6 | 73 |
This is a demographic table based on Olofström Municipality's electoral districts in the 2022 Swedish general election sourced from SVT's election platform, in turn taken from SCB official statistics.[2]
In total there were 13,243 residents, including 10,168 Swedish citizens of voting age.[2] 44.1% voted for the left coalition and 55.0% for the right coalition. Indicators are in percentage points except population totals and income.
| Location | |||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| data-sort-type="number" | data-sort-type="number" | data-sort-type="number" | % | data-sort-type="number" | % | data-sort-type="number" | data-sort-type="number" | data-sort-type="number" | data-sort-type="number" | data-sort-type="number" | |||||||
| Brännaregården | 1,396 | 1,118 | 40.1 | 58.7 | 80 | 76 | 24 | 25,130 | 32 | ||||||||
| Ekeryd-Gränum | 1,390 | 1,121 | 41.9 | 56.9 | 77 | 77 | 23 | 22,704 | 26 | ||||||||
| Jämshög | 1,773 | 1,367 | 46.3 | 52.9 | 79 | 77 | 23 | 24,482 | 30 | ||||||||
| Kyrkhult-Hemsjö | 1,857 | 1,420 | 40.8 | 59.0 | 85 | 89 | 11 | 25,399 | 30 | ||||||||
| Olofström C | 1,674 | 1,297 | 51.7 | 46.9 | 72 | 53 | 47 | 22,007 | 25 | ||||||||
| Olofström-Vilshult | 1,480 | 1,149 | 42.6 | 56.4 | 74 | 70 | 30 | 22,898 | 24 | ||||||||
| Oredslund | 1,789 | 1,319 | 46.4 | 53.1 | 76 | 55 | 45 | 23,246 | 26 | ||||||||
| Vilboken | 1,884 | 1,377 | 43.5 | 55.8 | 72 | 58 | 42 | 23,841 | 27 | ||||||||
| Source: SVT | |||||||||||||||||
The increased use of cars in the 1950s and 60's was the great boost for the municipality. Today the car industry, dominated by Volvo Cars, is the largest employer in Olofström with 2,400 employees, and some more working in other companies connected to this industry. The Volvo industry, with related production, is probably the main reason that the municipality's commuting surplus (as of 2005) is almost 2,000 a day, with many workers coming from the neighboring municipalities of a.o. Bromölla, Karlshamn and Sölvesborg.
Vilshult is a small village within the municipality, situated 10 km north of the central locality of Olofström. It is recognised for a photovoltaics (PV) modules factory that has been located there since 2001.