Luxembourg, 19/01/2001 (Agence Europe) - Greece has become, on 1 January 2001, the twelfth Member State of the Euro-zone. With 5.3% of the surface area of the Euro-zone and 3.5% of its population, Greece has only contributed, in 1999, for 1.9% of its total GDP. This is what noted Eurostat, on Thursday, when it underlines that the entry of Greece will thus only have a mild impact on the economic statistics of the Euro-zone as a whole. The Statistical office of the European Communities nevertheless underlines the specific characteristics that distinguish the new member from its eleven partners.
Thus Greece is the country of the Euro-zone where the share of household consumption in GDP is the greatest (72.3% of GDP in 1999, against 56.7% for the Euro-zone as a whole), notably due to the higher proportion of consumption of food products, and in particular vegetables. The share of investment is also the highest in Greece that in the Euro-zone as whole (23.7% of GDP against 21.5% for the EU12). On the hand side, the share of final consumption by public administrations is the lowest.
Furthermore, Greece is characterised by the weight of agriculture, trade and transports and communications that are higher than in all the other Member States of the Euro-zone (37.2% against 24.7%). The three last sectors cited are also those that contribute the most total added value in Greece, while in the rest of the Euro-zone, it is the financial activities and the company services as well as manufactured goods that form the most significant posts and together record close to half (49.6% of the added value (against 36.4% in Greece). Also to be noted is that the sector of financial and services activities see growth rates below those recorded in the Euro-zone as a whole, while construction, trade, transport and communication have seen higher growth in Greece than in the Euro-zone from 1996 to 1999.
During the same period, the annual rate of growth of the Greek economy was in general higher by roughly one point to that of the Euro-zone, but the GDP of Greece is nevertheless lower, below 32% in 1999 to the average. The growth in investments was significantly stronger in Greece than in the Euro-zone, of which the balance of external trade was regularly in surplus from 1996 to 1999, that of Greece was constantly in deficit.