As a national geographical indication product, Chongming golden melon has been unanimously favored by the general public because of its crisp taste and rich nutritional value, and it is known as "plant jellyfish". Now, with the optimization of Chongming's agricultural industrial structure, the agricultural product with Chongming characteristics has realized the large-scale planting of agricultural business entities and unified processing and sales on the basis of factory assembly lines, which has increased output and added value, and also appeared on "high-end dining tables".

In the early morning, the workers are busy transporting golden melon in the Golden Melon Planting Professional Cooperative Association located in Lianyi Village, Miao Town. They are packing golden melons, and then transporting them to the truck through the conveyor belt.

Fei Kang, head of the Association, said: "At present, we have the largest golden melon planting base in Chongming. The output of open-air golden melon is 1,000 kg per mu, and the output of greenhouse golden melon is estimated to be about 1,750 kg per mu."

Chongming is the major area of planting golden melon in the suburbs of Shanghai. According to relevant departments, at present, the cultivation area of golden melon in Chongming is about 2,000 mu, and the total annual output is about 4,000 tons.It is mainly from the large-scale cultivation of agricultural business entities such as the Association and Qimao Cooperative in Gangyan Town. Under the professional planting of cooperatives, they explore innovative cultivation methods such as greenhouse cultivation and "hanging vine planting". The greenhouse cultivation method can change the original open-air planting of only one crop into two crops a year, so as to reasonably avoid the impact of temperature. Golden melon can be removed before the Spring Festival, and the golden melon can mature as early as early May. "Hanging vine planting" can save land resources and effectively improve the yield per mu.

In Yuejin Food Processing Plant in Xinhai Town, workers are putting the golden melon from the Association onto the assembly line, and processing and packaging the golden melon through a series of industrialized assembly line operations, such as machine cooking, cutting, cleaning, bagging, disinfection and others.

Gu Yongxing, head of Shanghai Yuejin Food Co., Ltd., said, "Golden melon is processed from July to September every year. The golden melon we process is ordered from the association, and a small amount of them are purchased from farmers. The annual processing volume of golden melons reaches between 1 million kg and 1.5 million kg."

Chongming golden melon once competed with varieties from Shandong Province, Anhui Province, Jiangxi Province and other places, all of which were among the best. In recent years, in virtue of large-scale mass production and industrialized processing, Chongming golden melon has enhanced its added value and quality, opened up a broader market, and gradually appeared in the five-star catering industry, airline companies’ first-class seats and other high-end places.