The Greek economy grew by 16.2 percent in the second quarter of 2021 compared with the same period last year, with the country’s GDP rising 3.4% compared with the first quarter of the year, led by consumption, private investments and exports, Greek Statistics Authority ELSTAT said on Tuesday.
The Greek GDP fell 2.3% in the first quarter compared with the same period in 2020 and grew by around 7% in the first half of the year.
ELSTAT said that final consumption spending grew 12.1% in the second quarter, compared with the same period in 2020 (households comsumption up 13.2% and general government consumption up 6.1%).
Private investments (gross fixed capital investments) rose 12.9 pct, exports of goods and services were up 22.6 pct (exports of goods up 17.1 pct and exports of services up 28.8 pct). Imports of goods and services rose 22.5 pct (imports of goods up 19.7 pct and imports of services up 35.2 pct).
On a quarterly basis, final consumption spending was up 0.2 pct (household comsumption down 0.4 pct and general government consumption down 0.7 pct), private investments grew 4.3 pct, exports of goods and services rose 2.9 pct (goods up 2.9 pct and services up 0.8 pct) while imports of goods and services rose 5 pct (goods up 3.8 pct and services up 19.8 pct).
Commenting on the data, Finance Minister Christos Staikouras said that the provisional figures for the second quarter would lead to higher GDP growth rate this year compared with initial estimates of 3.6 pct and noted that the economy will quickly regain losses suffered by the pandemic, while households’ available income will improve significantly and the Greek economy will grow further for the benefit of all citizens.
PS Of course, economy grew in Q2 of this year, when with few exceptions economy was shut down in the corresponding period of last year due to the first pandemic lockdown.
Quite interesting that Staikouras doe snot explain how the household’s available income will significantly improve with a tsunami of price increases in electricity (+50%) and essential goods, when there is no talk for wages increases or significant tax decreases.
