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Greek trade worth $191 million

Tourism services dwarf goods earnings from Australia

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Greek trade worth $191 million

A priest buys olives at Athens’ central market last week. Greece exported $27 million worth of prepared and preserved vegetables to Australia in 2010-2011. PHOTO: AP PETROS GIANNAKOURIS

11 Apr 2012

Trade between Australia and Greece remained at low levels last year, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics.
The ABS reports that during the financial year 2010-2011, Greece exported goods worth $151 million to Australia, with the main items being vegetables - prepared and preserved ($27m), medicines ($20m), aluminium ($18m) and cheese ($13m).

In the most recent DFAT fact sheet for Greece, compiled using data from the ABS and the IMF, exports from Australia to Greece during the same period totalled $40m and included medicaments ($6m) waste and scrap ($2m), hides and skins ($2m) and paints ($1m). 56 per cent of Australian exports to Greece were deemed confidential.
In 2010, Australia's combined investments in Greece totalled $142 million.
Greece's top three export destinations in 2010 were France, Belgium, and the Russian Federation, representing over 50 per cent of all Greek exports.

Australia came in 35th place, accounting for 0.1 per cent.
Meanwhile, trade in services between Greece and Australia is almost double that of goods.
Putting all other figures in the shade, during the same period Greece earned more than $340m from providing travel services to Australians, reinforcing the centrality of tourism to Greece's economic relationship with Australia.

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Comments

Unbelievable. Let's consider what we do buy from the Hellenic Republic and, thus, what we could buy far more off. Feta (many varieties although the best only come from Epiros), yoghurt (Dodoni is amazing), olives (while there are many varieties - Samos, Miytilines and others the very best are Kalamata), olive oil, pasta, retsina, ouzo, Metaxa and other spirits, and more recently great beers like Mythos and Fix, dried figs, and a host of pickled vegetables, dried fruits, nuts, halva, okra, herbs, mountain teas, fassoulia, tomato paste, squid, ... Visit any good delicatessen and you will see a very large range indeed. Then many of us love the music, as well as other souvenirs - clothes, rings, pins, flags, copies of artefacts and so forth. But can we do better? I believe we can. That is why I drive from my home half an hour away to buy Dodoni Yoghurt. Yet, all alcohol is far more expensive here due to import fees, transport costs and profit margins by importers. For the same reason we do not get the cheap cigarettes and cigars that are plentiful across Hellas. I would love to read comments from other readers - how we CAN grow imports from Hellas into Australia. Are you willing to share your views?
Submitted by atkenos on Sat, 2012-04-14 16:53.
As I said in another article... Have you ever tried importing / exporting to Greece. It is like pulling teeth. Everyone wants to be paid off (at both ports) Greek businesses have no respect for deadlines or programme. There needs to be trade agreements between governments and a general shift in moving towards 'best practices' in International Trade.
Submitted by sandstorm7722 on Tue, 2012-04-24 16:40.

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