Greek Businesses Eye Indonesia Potential

London, Sept 12 (Antara) - Some 70 Greek businesspeople in the trade and industrial sectors as well as business officials of the Greek Foreign Affairs Ministry are taking part in a business luncheon titled `Doing Business with Indonesia` in Athena. "Supported by the Greek and Indonesian governments, the event, which is held at the Indonesian Embassy, is intended to increase trade volume between Indonesia and Greece," the Embassy`s Second Secretary Cahya Sumaningsih said here on Friday. On the occasion, Indonesian Ambassador to Greece Benny Bahanadewa explained the economic development and potentials of Indonesia. Indonesia is able to post an economic growth of over 5 percent amid global economic crisis. The ambassador expressed hope that Indonesia and Greece which have built relations over the past 21 years would continue to increase their trade and economic relations. In order to provide comprehensive understanding, the embassy invited Dimitris Ramoglous, the Honorary Consul of Indonesia who is also a furniture importer in Indonesia and Panagis Vourloumis, a former chief executive officer of the biggest Greek telecommunications firm OTE. The two noted businessmen shared their experience in developing business in Indonesia. Therefore, the event gained warm welcome from Greek businesses and attracted them to develop business in Indonesia. The Indonesian embassy in Athena also invited Greek business makers to visit Trade Expo 2014 in Jakarta on October 8-12, 2014. They could use their visit to the expo as a first step in doing business in Indonesia. The trade volume between Indonesia and Greek is still relatively low if compared with that between Indonesia and other European Union members like Germany, France, the Netherlands and Britain. Total trade between Indonesia and the European Union in 2013 reached 24.10 billion euro while Indonesia`s trade volume with Greek was only 166.49 million euro. Indonesia`s exports to Greek included palm oil, paper, shoes, electronic machines, garments, furniture, telecommunication equipment, coffee, tea, cocoa, pulp and waste paper, tobacco, transportation equipment, industrial machines, electronic machines and crude fertilizer. Indonesia`s trade commodities which have the potentials to be developed in Greek are coffee, cocoa while those of Greek are olive oil, pharmaceutical products and canned fruit products.