(also Saar), a region in the western part of the Federal Republic of Germany, located in the basins of the Saar and Moselle rivers and bordering on France and Luxembourg. Area, 2,600 sq km. Population, 1,000,000 (1973), 83 percent of which is urban. The capital is Saarbrücken.
The economy of Saarland is dominated by industry. Of the economically active population (406,000 in 1972), 51.5 percent work in industry, 2 percent in agriculture and forestry, and 19.5 percent in transportation and commerce. The Saar is an important area for heavy industry, primarily the metallurgical industry, and the coal industry. A crisis in the coal industry has seriously affected the region’s economy. In 1973, 27 percent of all industrial workers were employed in ferrous metallurgy, 13.6 percent in the coal industry, 7.5 percent in general machine building, 6.2 percent in the production of electrical articles, 7.1 percent in the manufacture of steel and light-metal structural members, and 4.0 percent in the textile and clothing industry. The Saar produces 10.4 million tons of coal, or approximately 10 percent of the Federal Republic of Germany’s total output (1972); the coal mines are concentrated around the cities of Neunkirchen, Sulzbach, and St. Ingbert and in areas near the French border. The Saar produces 1.5 million tons of coke, 4.4 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity, 4.5 million tons of cast iron, and 5 million tons of steel. The main centers of ferrous metallurgy are Völklingen, Neunkirchen, and Saarbrücken. The Saar has a chemical industry, which produces coke by-products, industrial rubber goods, and nitrogen fertilizers. It also has oil refining; the refinery in Klarenthal has an output of 2.3 million tons. Motor vehicles are assembled in Saarlouis. The Saar has plants for the production of railroad cars, electrical articles, glass, and Mettlach tile. The clothing and meat-processing industries are prominent consumer-goods industries.
Small and average farms, up to 10 hectares in size, account for 80 percent of all farms and for 25 percent of all agricultural land in Saarland (1973). Farms of 20–50 hectares account for 10 percent of all farms and for 41.4 percent of all agricultural land. Cultivated land constitutes 56.4 percent of the agricultural land (including 37.6 percent planted with grains and 7.3 percent with fodder crops). Meadows and pastures constitute 35 percent, and vegetable gardens, orchards, and vineyards 8.3 percent. Forests cover approximately 31.5 percent of the Saar. Animal husbandry dominates agricultural production; in 1973 there were 75,400 head of cattle, including 28,000 dairy cows, and 73,500 swine.
There is a dense transportation network in Saarland, especially in the Saarlouis-Saarbrücken-Ottweiler area. The Mann-heim-Saarbrücken highway connects with France’s highway network. The Moselle and Saar rivers are navigable.
A. I. MUKHIN
History. In the Middle Ages, the area that is now the Saar was a county in the Holy Roman Empire. From the 1790’s until 1814, the Saar was a French possession. In 1815 most of it was ceded to Prussia; the rest was ceded to Bavaria. From 1871 it was part of the German Empire. In accordance with the Treaty of Versailles of 1919, the Saar was placed under the authority of a League of Nations commission for 15 years. Its coal mines were ceded to France. In 1935, as the result of a plebiscite, the Saar reverted to Germany, which purchased the coal mines of the Saar from France in accordance with the terms of the peace treaty.
After World War II, the Saar was in the French occupation zone and subsequently in the economic, monetary, and tariff system of France. In accordance with the agreement On the Statute of the Saar between France and the Federal Republic of Germany, an agreement that was incorporated in the Paris Agreements of 1954, the Saar was placed under the temporary control of the Western European Union. In a referendum in October 1955, however, the majority of Saar inhabitants rejected this statute. By the terms of the Saar treaty of 1956 between France and the Federal Republic of Germany, the Saar became part of the Federal Republic of Germany on Jan. 1, 1957; economic union with the Federal Republic of Germany was achieved by July 1959 as stipulated in an agreement between the Federal Republic of Germany and France.