in 22 provinces, 4 municipalities, 5 autonomous regions and 2 special administrative regions shared by 56 distinct ethnic groups, the largest of which are the Han , who constitute about 91.9% of the total population. Large ethnic minorities include the Zhuang (16 million), Manchu (10 million), Hui (9 million), Miao (8 million), Uyghur (7 million), Yi