Municipalities with language facilities

In Belgium, there are 27 municipalities with language facilities (Dutch: faciliteitengemeenten; French: communes à facilités; German: Fazilitäten-Gemeinden), which must offer linguistic services to residents in Dutch, French, or German in addition to their single official languages. All other municipalities – with the exception of those in the bilingual Brussels region – are monolingual and only offer services in their official languages, either Dutch or French.

Belgian law stipulates that:

• 12 municipalities in Flanders must offer services in French; of these 12, six (located around Brussels) are now believed to have become majority French-speaking.
• Wallonia contains two language areas:
  • In the French-speaking part of Wallonia, four municipalities offer services in Dutch and another two offer services in German.
  • All municipalities in the German-speaking part of Wallonia (annexed after WWI) offer services in French in addition to German.
• In Brussels, Dutch and French are co-official.
• At the federal level, Dutch, French and German are all official languages.