White Britons likely to become exiguous in near future: Study

London, Dec 24 (UNI) White Britons will become a minority in a dozen towns and cities of UK within 30 years, recent findings suggest.

A record number of immigration combined with higher birth rates among newcomers will tip the balance between whites and non-whites creating a string of 'superdiverse' cities with no single group forming a majority, the study revealed.

City like Leicester, with a large Indian community, has seen its white population fall from 70.1 per cent of the total in 1991 to 59.5 today, and the figure is predicted to fall below a half by around 2020.

Its Indian population is set to rise from 22.9 to 26 per cent over the same period, with the African population increasing from 0.4 to 11.2 per cent.

Talking of cities like Birmingham has shown strikingly different trends, with the shift in the balance driven mainly by the growing Pakistani community, the Daily Mail reported.

In comparison to London's population which will still remain 61 per cent white by 2026, according to the study from the University of Sheffield.

''Britain is becoming ever more plural and our diversity ever more diverse,'' said Danny Dorling, professor of human geography.

In general, immigrant and ethnic minority populations will no longer be dominated by large, distinct Afro-Caribbean or Asian communities, said Prof Dorling.

Instead increasing numbers will come from countries scattered across the world from Germany to Guyana and Sweden to Singapore.

''Even if we prohibited another single soul from entering the country, the trends have already laid root,'' said Sukhvinder Stubbs, of the Barrow Cadbury Trust which commissioned the study.

UNI