With absolute success and with the massive participation of the business and chamber community, a series of events was organized by the Chamber of Florina with the support of EURICON, on the three days of 21-23/07/2023, at the Chamber's headquarters.
The events started on Friday afternoon with the open meeting of the expanded Administrative Committee of the Union Of Hellenic Chambers Of Commerce (UHCC), during which Mr. Ioannis Masoutis, President of the Central Union of Chambers of Greece, stated that the UHCC. always remains close to Greek businesses in their efforts to overcome all the obstacles that have arised from the successive financial, health and energy crises, while expressing his optimism for the course of business in Greece.
For his part, Mr. Savvas Sapalidis, President of the Florina Chamber, after welcoming all the participants to Florina, referred to the strengths and weaknesses of the local economy, as well as the opportunities and risks faced by the local business community in the context of the current process of delignitization. He also pointed out the necessity of reconstructing the local economic and production model in a green and digital direction, aiming in particular at the utilization of the endogenous resources of the region, such as the highly nutritious local agricultural products, the high-quality local wine-culinary tradition and the rich but unexploited environmental – cultural and touristic resources.
The next day, Saturday morning, the Conference on: "THE ROLE OF CHAMBERS IN THE INTERNATIONALIZATION OF BUSINESSES" took place, with the keynote speaker being the President of the Exporters' Association (SEVE), Mr. Symeon Diamantidis, who referred to the importance of the internationalization of Greek businesses as a driver of their development.
Afterwards, representatives of Development Agencies (ANKO DYTIKIS MACEDONIAS A.E., ANFLO S.A., KANON AMKE) and bilateral Chambers (Hellenic-Italian Chamber, Hellenic-German Chamber and Greek-Serbian Chamber) took the floor and presented Good Practices for Supporting the Internationalization of Greek Businesses.
Immediately after, 4 Local Businesses with strong export character (EAS AMYNTAIOU, RGCC – Papasotiriou Ioannis Monoprosopi SA, Tiriakidis B&T Composites, and Boskos Christos and Co., Winery) presented their corresponting good practices, and were subsequently awarded for their business performance in international markets.
The Conference concluded with the signing of a Memorandum of Cooperation between the Chamber of Florina and the Exporters' Association (SEVE) for the joint undertaking of relevant actions to promote the extroversion of local businesses.
After the end of the Conference, followed a visit to 2 Wineries of the area (EAS AMYNTAIOU and KTIMA ALFA) where the participants were given the opportunity to get to know the high quality local wine products and their production method.
The events concluded on Sunday morning with a tourist tour of Prespes, where the participants were introduced to an internationally renowned sustainable tourist destination.
Finally, all the above events were attended by a number of local businessmen, representatives of the chamber community, of the local and the regional self-government and the government, such as the Deputy Minister of the Interior (Macedonia - Thrace Sector) Mr. Efstathios Konstantinidis, the local MP Mr. Stavros Papasotiriou, the Regional Governor of Western Macedonia, Mr. Giorgos Kasapidis, the Regional Deputy Governor of Florina, Mr. Sotirios Vosdou, the Mayor of Florina, Mr. Vassilios Giannakis, the Mayor of Amyntaio, Mr. Anthimos Bitakis, the Mayor of Prespon, Mr. Panagiotis Paschalidis, the General Secretary of GSEVEE, Mr. Dimitris Vargiamis, the President of the Federation of Trade Associations of Western and Central Macedonia Mr. Nektarios Elmaloglou, the President of KEPA - ANEM Mr. Thomas Algianakoglou, etc.