by Maria Spiliopoulou, Liu Yongqiu
ATHENS, May 4 (Xinhua) -- During the eight-year debt crisis, Greece has seen an exodus of its young talents, who had to seek opportunities out of their home country.
But some chose to stay to build a better future at home. George Papachristos is one of them.
Papachristos now is the CEO of Toorbee, a pioneering B2B travel platform that connects small and medium-sized destination service providers from Europe with major online travel agents in China.
He started Toorbee with his brother Nikos in the second half of 2016. But in no more than two years, the brothers' venture has become outstanding thanks to its impressive growth among the over 1,000 start-ups established in Greece during the crisis years.
With 200 suppliers from nine European countries already on board, over 3,000 products on the platform and cooperating with 80-85 percent of the Chinese online travel market, Toorbee aspires to build a bridge to cater to the demands of the dynamic Chinese tourism market.
Toorbee's success is inspiring against the backdrop of the talents exodus during the Greek debt crisis.
According to the data from the central Bank of Greece, some 427,000 Greeks have left the country in the past decade. Half of them were highly educated and qualified youth.
They left for job opportunities. Official data showed that in the peak of the crisis, Greeks aged under 25 faced unemployment rates of 60 percent. Now the figure dropped to about 44 percent.
Brain drain has weighed heavily on the ailing economy. Since 2008, these talented Greeks who sought opportunities abroad have contributed more than 50 billion euros (60 billion U.S. dollars) to the countries where they now live and work, non-profit organization Endeavor Greece estimates.
"Greece has invested in creating this educated and skilled workforce which now produces value to other economies and societies," Papachristos said when speaking to Xinhua this week. In his opinion, it will take two generations and titanic efforts to convince these talents to return to Greece and reverse the trend.
Papachristos comes from a family with a strong entrepreneurial background, with studies in business, international relations, political science and international political economy in Greece and the United States. He first worked in the family business -- wholesale men's fashion production.
After selling the family business, the two brothers were in different businesses from trade to renewable energy and real estate. But after an extensive travel to China, they decided to invest in tourism platform to provide tailor-made itineraries for independent travelers from China.
Toorbee was created to offer the tools to small European operators selling tourism services that don't have the resources to produce video and audio content in Chinese for their products in order to gain access to the Chinese market.
Doing business in Greece is not an easy task after eight years of recession.
"Doing business in Greece was always a complicated procedure. We try to focus and depend on market forces and not on government forces to grow our business. The crisis gave an opportunity for people who could connect with foreign capital and foreign demand...The crisis has pushed people to take risks and I think it is healthy," Papachristos explained.
"Before, Greeks were working as a one-man show. Synergies and team working were not very common. Slowly this is changing," he added.
But he was impressed by China, from the rapid change, growth, innovation to the business culture.
"The synergy of government, private sector and innovation is something you cannot find in any other country," he said.
After winning an award for the most promising project among 700 companies in a competition in December 2015 in China, Papachristos is considering registering Toorbee in Hangzhou to gain access to local government incentives to further grow the venture.
He will continue living and working in Greece, but is looking beyond borders for opportunities. (1 euro = 1.20 U.S. dollars)
