Jiang Sizhang was 14-years-old when he was forced into the Nationalist Party army in 1950 and, along with 1.2 million others, fled home to the Taiwan island after their defeat in the civil war. What followed was 30 years of confrontation across the Taiwan Straits.

However, in the early 1980s, some war veterans managed to meet their long-lost families on the mainland in some neutral third regions, and a few dared come back to the mainland secretly. Jiang was one of them.

Another Taiwanese citizen, Zhou Chunjuan was granted the first "legal" tourist certificate to visit the mainland in November 1987, reuniting with her mother in her hometown Changzhou after nearly 40 years' separation.

Since then, the tide of Taiwan investment swept through China westward. And the citizens on both sides of the Taiwan Straits pushed their respective governments to have more open communications with each other, leading to a loosening of restrictions. In addition, the timing of Taiwan's economic boom and the mainland's opening up led to more open economic policies.

In the past 20 years, Taiwan's investments on the mainland have shifted from labor-intensive industries to capital-intensive industries, then hi-tech companies and, since 2005, service sectors.

More and more Taiwanese entrepreneurs are coming to seize a share of the booming market -- first in Shanghai and other cities on the Yangtze River Delta, then the entire coastal belt, and now further inland.

So far, more than 100 local associations of Taiwanese companies have established themselves on the mainland with nearly 20,000 members. These numbers account for one third of the total Taiwanese-funded enterprises on the mainland.

As a result, the Association of Taiwanese-Invested Enterprises on the Mainland was established, serving as a platform to promote cross-Strait economic and trade exchanges, and the peaceful development of Cross-Straits relations.