Over four million British people belong to ethnic minority communities. Large scale immigration after the Second World War saw immigrants set up or add to existing ethnic communities in urban centres across the country.

To find out in which areas different ethnic populations have made their homes use the links on the right to view a series of six different maps: One each for the black Caribbean, black African, black other, Indian, Pakistani and Bangladeshi communities.

A note on sources

These maps are based on information from the 1991 census and are the most detailed figures that currently exist on the location of different populations. However, they will be superceded by the publication of 2001 census later this year.

More recent population estimates were made by the Office for National Statistics in 2001. It based its figures on the Labour Force Survey for the year 2000.

These figures were used to build a picture of different populations but they are not as detailed as the census and only cover regional rather than district level.

However, it did use the same terms of reference as the census and the findings are used in the map’s commentary.