By the end of 2007, the province had two prefecture-level cities, six county-level cities, four counties, six autonomous counties, four municipal districts and 1 office (county level), namely Haikou and Sanya, Wuzhishan, Wenchang, qionghai city, Wanning, Danzhou, Dongfang, Ding 'an, Tunchang, Chengmai and Lingao.
Ancient islanders engaged in gathering, fishing and hunting production, and successively created primitive aquaculture. According to ancient records, at least 2,000 years ago, crops such as rice, cotton, sericulture, ramie, yam and coix lachryma were planted in Hainan Island, and livestock such as cattle, sheep, chickens and pigs were raised. Hainan Island is one of the birthplaces of rice planting and cotton planting in China, and the ancestors of Li nationality also cultivated an early rice variety "Shan Lan Rice" which can grow in mountainous areas. In the Tang Dynasty, Hainan initially formed an agricultural belt around the island. In the Song Dynasty, due to the increase of Han immigrants, the use of iron farm tools and cattle, the construction of water conservancy and the introduction of crops such as Zhancheng rice, peanuts and oranges, Hainan's agriculture approached the level of the Central Plains. In the Ming Dynasty, duck feet millet, sweet potato (also called sweet potato or sweet potato), corn, sesame, tobacco, pepper, pumpkin, tomato, onion, cabbage and other crops began to be introduced. Among them, improved rice varieties and high-yield crop sweet potato were successfully introduced and spread to the mainland, which was called the second revolution in the history of grain production in China by agricultural historians. Hainan used to be basically self-sufficient in grain in the middle of Ming Dynasty. Hainan began to become a national breeding base in the Qing Dynasty, but it still relied on the mainland to import grain for most of its history. Hainan's unique natural conditions are conducive to the development of tropical cash crops. As early as the Han Dynasty, tropical and subtropical crops such as coconut, betel nut, litchi, longan, banana, sugarcane, kapok and fig, as well as medicinal plants such as Alpinia oxyphylla, Amomum villosum and Morinda officinalis were widely planted on the island. Carambola, pineapple and jackfruit were introduced in Liang Xiao period of Southern Dynasties and in the middle and late Ming Dynasty. Since modern times, the production of tropical cash crops has made a breakthrough, and Hainan Island has begun to take shape as the largest tropical crop production base in China.