New York Times
July 21, 2011
The debt-wracked Greek government has pinned much of its hope for economic recovery on the country’s tourism sector, which accounts for a fifth of the gross domestic product and has seen a rebound this year — with foreign arrivals up by nearly 10 percent — after a difficult 2010.
But vehement protests by members of cosseted professions against reforms that Greece has agreed to push through in exchange for billions of euros in loans from foreign creditors are undermining the sector at the worst possible time, industry officials said.
“The protesters are shooting themselves in the foot — their livelihoods depend on tourism,” said Giorgos Drakopoulos, the general manager of Sete, an umbrella association for Greek hoteliers and travel agents. Mr. Drakopoulos said his members had received “lots of complaints” from foreign tour operators and frustrated tourists who were unlikely to return. “If you had to drag your luggage a kilometer through the heat to get to the airport because of some taxi drivers, would you come back?” he asked.
Protests by Greek taxi drivers, which have frustrated thousands of tourists at the height of summer, entered a fourth day Thursday, just as seamen threatened to compound the problem by staging their own strikes against austerity measures, a move that sought to paralyze all the country’s ports.
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