Mindoro (Tagalog pronunciation) the seventh-largest island in the Philippines. It is located off the coast of

 Luzon, and northeast of Palawan. The southern coast of Mindoro forms the northeastern extremum of the

Sulu Sea.

In past times, it has been called Ma-i or Mait by ancient Chinese traders and, by Spaniards, as Mina de Oro

(meaning "gold mine") from where the island got its current name. The island was once a single province from

1920 to 1950 when it was divided into its two present-day provinces, Occidental Mindoro and Oriental Mindoro.

According to the late historian William Henry Scott,^[2] an entry in the official history of the Sung Dynasty for the

year 972 mentions Ma-i as a trading partner of China. Other Chinese records referring to Ma-i or Mindoro appear in the years that follow.

Prehispanic Source Materials enumerates the products that Mindoro traders exchanged with the Chinese as

"beeswax, cotton, true pearls, tortoise shell, medicinal betelnuts and yu-ta [jute?] cloth" for Chinese porcelain,

trade gold, iron pots, lead, colored glass beads and iron needles.

The economy of Mindoro is largely based on agriculture. Products consist of a wide variety of fruits, such as

citrus, bananas, lanzones, rambutan, and coconuts, such cereals as rice and maize, sugar cane, peanuts,

fish (catfish, milkfish, tilapia), livestock, and poultry. Logging and the mining of marble and copper also thrive.

Tourism is a lucrative business as well, with locations such as Apo Reef National Park, Lubang Island,

Puerto Galera, Sabang Beach, and Mount Halcon. Puerto Galera's beaches are the island's most known

 tourist attraction and are widely visited.

The principal language in Mindoro is Tagalog, although in some parts it has been greatly influenced by the

 native Visayan and Mangyan languages. Mainstream Filipino and Taglish are, indeed, present in and around

such areas as Puerto Galera, Pinamalayan, and Calapan City. Visayan and Mangyan languages, too, are spoken on the island, as are Ilokano and some foreign languages — e.g., English, Fukien, and, to a much lesser

extent, Spanish.

The common religions on the island fall under Christianity. The religion of the indigenous Mangyan population

 is animism. Though they are into animism as a religion, the Catholic Church in some of Mindoro's parts is

also active.