Early Survival Of Zhejiang Merchants In The June 14Th European Debt Crisis

In December 2009, when the rest of the world was struggling to get out of the shadow of the financial crisis, the three major Rating firm such as S & P downgraded Greece's sovereign ratings one after another.

After that, Italy, Portugal, Spain and other euro zone countries have successively fallen into debt crisis.

Eurozone has become another centre of concern after the Wall Street crisis.

Since May this year, as a concession to the EU aid program, the Greek government has adopted a series of fiscal tightening policies such as reducing workers' wages and so on.

For a time, the whole eurozone is in a precarious situation. The world economy may have two bottom searches, and even more predict that the euro will disappear after its birth 11 years.

Under such circumstances, can those businessmen in Europe go through peace? Will their business activities be impacted? Are they choosing to stick to or retreat?

With these questions, I went to Zhejiang Province's "fortune", the global action of today's morning post, and chose to enter Europe deeply in debt crisis at the end of May.

In the afternoon of May 28th, the Plaza de la Constitucin at the foot of the Acropolis in Athens was baked by an incandescent sun.

The two guardians of the gendarmerie are moving at a weird pace.

As the clock gets closer and closer, there are more and more crowds on the square. They have different colors and different languages. They come from all over the world to watch the gendarmerie changing ceremony at every point on Plaza de la Constitucin.

Just a week ago, the site was packed with people and became the core area of the largest strike March since the financial crisis.

The scene of the scene made the parade a week ago suddenly become very far away.

It was this strike March that made Zhejiang more than a thousand miles away pay more attention to Zhejiang merchants under the European debt crisis.

We are good here.

"Brother, how are you doing there? No, just come back."

Money is endless, and safety is most important. "

Recently, Weng Jindong, chairman of the Greek Wanjia group, always received similar messages from friends from home.

Since May, with the escalation of the debt crisis in Greece, a series of strikes have taken place in Athens.

In May 28th, Weng Jin Dong station told reporters in a relaxed manner on the streets of Athens: "I am very grateful to the care of my hometown people, but our side is not so chaotic as we imagine."

He also pointed out that pedestrians hurried across the streets of Athens asked reporters, "can you see that there is chaos after the big strike in this city?"

Having said that, many of the relatives of Zhejiang businessmen are still worried about their families.

Yang Jie and his wife have been doing business in Athens for over 5 years, and their son, who is just over two years old, has been with them in Athens.

But after the Greek debt crisis and a series of strikes, parents at home must send their sons back to their country.

"There was nothing here, but in order to make the old man feel at ease, we had to send the child back to China."

Weng Jindong told reporters that the strike is not uncommon for Greece, and that the annual strike of May was the most frequent period in this country.

This year, because of the debt crisis of the government and the reduction of the wages of high-income people, the strike has attracted more and more attention from the world.

Reporters interviewed several Greek locals on the streets of Athens.

They all said they also wanted to tide over the difficulties with the government, and did not want the country to go bankrupt. They did so (strike) just to teach the politicians who had been irresponsible before.

Depreciation of the euro is harder to carry.

In May 28th, when the reporter came to the most concentrated overseas Chinese in Athens, it was already 5 o'clock in the evening, but the sun was still burning.

"It's strange that it's so late that the temperature outside is more than 30 degrees Celsius."

The driver complained to himself about the weather in Athens.

Indeed, such a high temperature, even when Athens is in midsummer, is rare.

This makes many people living in Athens very uncomfortable.

Weng Jindong raised the T-shirt fan and said, "the weather outside is midsummer, but our business is in the severe winter."

He told reporters that the shop he opened was not the right time, just caught up with the economic downturn, and today's sales are only more than 4000 euros, and according to the previous situation, his store should be able to do about 10 thousand euros a day.

Weng Jindong was not alone. When he arrived, Xu Weichun, the president of the Chinese General Chamber of Commerce of overseas Chinese in Greece, took a reporter to the shops in the Chinese area.

One of the biggest words he told reporters was how much the daily turnover was, and how much it is now.

According to Xu Weichun estimates, the turnover of these shops in Athens has generally been reduced by about half.

Weng Jindong analysis, this debt crisis, led to the decline of Greek people's income, which makes their consumer confidence sharply reduced.

And the consumption tax has increased from 19% to 21%, and has increased to 23% since June 1st.

However, the most damaging thing for European and Zhejiang businessmen is the depreciation of the euro.

Weng Jindong believes that the consumer confidence drop caused by the debt crisis is only temporary.

"Things will definitely improve in a few months.

After all, China's products are relatively low-end products, many of which are ordinary people's necessities.

Income may be reduced, luxury items may not be used, but the pots and pans of food must be bought. "

The depreciation of the euro makes it difficult for them to carry on.

Since the renminbi is pegged to the US dollar, the value of the euro has depreciated and the renminbi has appreciated in relative terms.

"In just a few months, the renminbi has appreciated about 15% against the euro.

These 15% are our pure profits.

Weng Jindong said with some heartache.

Not only Greece, but also the depreciation of the euro made the merchants of the whole euro area feel the same pressure.

Huang Xuesheng, chairman of the Zhejiang European Group, who started business in France, told reporters that in their market, many of the Zhejiang businessmen insisted on losing money because of the depreciation of the euro.

They will stick to it.

When they say how difficult business is to do, and when it comes to emotion, the reporter suddenly asks, if so, have you ever considered withdrawing domestic development?

"Of course not."

Whether in Greece, Italy or France, Zhejiang businessmen, faced with such problems, are almost reflexively jumping out of these words.

Therefore, they chose to stick to it.

At this time, many natural characters of Zhejiang businessmen began to play a role.

Weng Jindong, a teacher in the country, said, "no matter how bad it is, the Greek economy will be better than some countries in Africa and Eastern Europe.

Many Zhejiang businessmen can do well in these places. What reason do we have to do in Greece? "

In order to deal with the crisis, they also began to take various measures to reduce costs.

Weng Jindong said, this is not difficult for Zhejiang businessmen.

With the deterioration of the Greek economic situation, shops and landlords talk about rent reduction.

"People in Athens are very reasonable. Our rent is basically reduced by 5%~10% at present."

Weng Jindong told reporters.

In addition, many of them have reduced the number of workers employed.

"Originally pure boss, and now busy, are their own hands."

Huang Weisheng told reporters that Zheshang itself has the spirit of hard work.

Another exciting thing for European Zhejiang businessmen is that China COSCO Group has leased the right to use Athens port 2 and 3 for 35 years.

"This will become a pit point for Chinese goods in Europe," Weng Jindong said.

For us, the goods from Ningbo port can be one week faster than before.

In this way, we can reduce inventory and not affect our sales. "