“It has been years since anyone said anything positive about the Greek economy,” writes Adam Davidson for The New York Times and adds that Greece has two aces up its sleeve, feta cheese and olive oil.
However, the paper reports that despite the fact that both products are very popular across the world, “Greece has only 28 percent of the global feta market and a mere 4 percent share of the international olive-oil industry.”
According to a EU rule, feta cheese is mandated to come from Greece alone. But other countries such as the USA, France and Denmark violate this rule by altering the original recipe turning feta into a laboratory-like product (less salty, more creamy, not Greek in brief) and thus, selling it all over the world instead of importing feta cheese from Greece.
The editor stresses also the fact that in addition to this rule violation, Greece itself does not take advantage of its products. Greek workers strike pretty often while agricultural companies, or at least some of them, are completely unorganized, making exports yet more difficult.
The article entitled “What Greece Makes, the World Might Take” hosts also the results of a recent report on Greece’s economy conducted by the consulting firm McKinsey. According to their survey, “with just a bit of investment” Greece could increase its profit from feta, olive oil as well the tourism industries significantly.
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