On the facade of the Karyatis tavern in a square with palm trees and plants under the Acropolis, the announcement says it all: “Personnel, chefs, waiters, kitchen staff”. With a record number of tourists expected to visit Athens this summer, restaurant owners do not risk it. “It is getting harder to find employees,” said Dimitris Stathokostopoulos, who runs the restaurant with his brother, according to the Guardian. “Tourism is definitely on the rise, but these days the Greeks prefer to work 9 to 5 in office jobs.”

In the countdown to the start of the season, the search for staff who will keep the industry alert has gained an unexpected urgent importance, the British media notes. Greece may be one of Europe’s most popular destinations, but employees are lacking.

The shortcomings are such that just weeks before the arrival of tourists, it is estimated that 80,000 jobs have not yet been covered in the food and hotel sector – the backbone of an industry that, with 25% of GDP, is the locomotive of the Greek economy.

Stathokostopoulos is not the only businessman struggling to find staff to meet the demands of the popular tavern at the busiest time of the year, the Guardian adds.

At national level, hoteliers are in a race to find reception managers, cleaners, lifeguards, waiters and cooks. In islands with great traffic, such as Crete and Rhodes, reports of hoteliers who have stolen employees from competitors with promises of better pay and working conditions have increased sharply.

“It is partly a legacy of the Covid-19 pandemic, experienced by all of Europe, but in Greece the problem is particularly acute,” said George Hotzoglou, president of the Pan-Hellenic Federation of Food and Tourism Workers. “What we see is an unprecedented lack of specialized and experienced workers, especially in the hotel and food industry, after the employees’ exit during Lockdown. Many never returned. As a result, it is estimated that 80,000 jobs are now required to be covered. “

The seasonality of the industry is responsible for Hodzoglou. “As soon as the season is over, employees are only entitled to three months of unemployment benefit. When there is a life cost crisis, how are they expected to survive the rest of the year? “

Tourism is not the only sector affected by the lack of workforce. Construction and agriculture have also been affected by a lack of a country that is not only faced with a dramatic demographic decline, but is still overwhelmed by the exit of more than 500,000 mainly students and high -special employees in the climax of the nearly ten -year financial crisis.

In an attempt to tackle the problem, partly due to pressure from local MPs, the center -right government has tried to legalize the regime of about 30,000 non -registered immigrants, the Guardian said. He has also signed a series of bilateral agreements “on the mobility of the workforce” with third countries such as Egypt, Vietnam, Bangladesh, Georgia, India and Moldova.

“I just received a suggestion of recruitment from a company in Dubai I consider,” Stathokostopoulos said. “A Bangladeshian works in our kitchen and is excellent. They are people from Asia and other parts of the world who are now applying for such work. “

Asylum seekers, who until recently remained in refugee hosting centers, will take up work in northern Greece later this month, after being trained by the Hellenic Hoteliers Association – an innovative step in a country where the Coast Guard and other officials have been charged with

Since taking over the leadership of the Ministry of Migration in March, Makis Voridis has vowed to deport the “illegal immigrants”, tightening a government policy that adopts a “harsh but fair” approach to immigration.

“It is inconceivable to discuss a growing number of deportations when statistics show that 750,000 jobs should be covered in Greece by 2050,” said Sofia Kouvelakis, head of the Home Project, an organization supporting refugee and immigrant children in Athens. “More than 1,400 children have gone through our structures and hundreds have succeeded when they were given the opportunity to often very high jobs.”

Officials do not overlook that Greece’s dilemma has also been motivated by its own success: in a revitalized economy that is also one of the fastest growing in Europe, unemployment rates have decreased by half, from 18% to 9% in the last six years.

“Five hundred thousand new jobs have been created in areas ranging from construction to logistics, retail services and health care,” said Spyros Protopsaltis, DBA commander. “The rhetoric around vacancies is, I think, a little too much, but there are still unused sources of work … starting with women.”

Time is vital. By 2028, the Ministry of Tourism has predicted 40 million visitors – almost four times the population of the country – as a result of increased arrivals mainly from the emerging markets of India and China. The tourist season is also prolonged as travel habits change with climate change.

Greece has begun to make active recruitment from abroad, organizing work reports on career days in Germany, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. In addition to foreigners, hope is that the Greeks who have left during the financial crisis will be returned, Mr Protopsaltis said. “We say to the world: Come back,” he said. “The Greek economy is not what you remember. It is doing very well. “