The Chinese word for saffron is zanghonghua, which means Tibetan red flower, and with a strong misconception in mind many tourists in Tibet have sought it out as a souvenir. Chongming (on the estuary of the Yangtze River and the East China Sea) is the largest producer of the flower in China, accounting for more than 90 percent of the output.

Gu Jianpei, a veteran saffron grower and trader in Chongming, said the island started to plant the flower early in the 1980s, after a biologist consulting for Shanghai Medicine Group discovered that the sand-soil in Chongming is ideal for the flower, which is widely used in traditional Chinese medicine.

Saffron, native to the Mediterranean, has stringent environmental needs to grow successfully, unable to survive below minus seven degree Celsius or above 30 degree Celsius, or with any chemicals or chemically polluted soil.