Greece Eyes Lucrative Chinese Market

Greek Tourism Minister Elena Kountoura said Greece aims to attract between 500,000-600,000 Chinese tourists each year for the next two years. Kountoura noted that the number of Chinese tourists to Greece had risen almost tenfold in the last two years, from 15,000-20,000 in 2015 to some 150,000 at present,  Torono News reported. “This is a significant increase even if this number does not yet satisfy us, given that the number of Chinese travelling to Europe is 15 million,” she added. The minister also referred to efforts to open new tourism markets, such as South Korea, China, the Middle East, India and Brazil and “rekindle” existing markets, such as Russia and the United States. China is the world's largest outbound travel market, with over 135 million Chinese tourists traveling abroad in 2016. The Chinese are also high-spenders, having spent $261 billion last year on their overseas trips.