Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis forecast a strong rebound in tourism in the summer of 2021, saying speedy vaccination drives in key markets for Greece, including Britain and Israel, will pave the way for tourists to return despite the current industry’s gloom, according to a report out of Reuters on Thursday.
Tourism, which accounts for about 20 percent of the Greek economy and directly employs one in five workers, collapsed last year as the coronavirus pandemic sent its revenues slumping to 4 billion euros from a high of 18 billion in 2019, according to the report.
Since last summer, when the pandemic subsided across Europe, the virus has surged once again, triggering renewed lockdowns and travel restrictions and pushing the region’s death toll above 750,000. Vaccines are now making their way through the most critical populations but the supply is lagging all over the world.
“I am a realist, but I am also cautiously optimistic that we will do much better than last year,” Mitsotakis told Reuters.
The Prime Minister also defended a decision to coordinate EU member states’ vaccine purchases through the European Commission, saying the bloc’s smaller countries would have faced serious problems negotiating deals on their own.
Persian
