Greece is seeking its role in the new European defense map, proposing the exploitation of opportunities for investment in innovation, cutting-edge technologies and strategic alliances.
Greek defense companies, at least those that can, want to participate in the defense action launched by Brussels, claiming market share and active participation, which extends to the design, production and implementation of defense projects.
As experts emphasized, this is a special business activity that has a national impact since it concerns the security of the country and offers economic surplus value provided that the conditions are met and not private interests are served.
On the crucial question of whether strengthening the defense industry can help the lost productivity and competitiveness of Europe and by extension the EU member states, experts pointed out that it can be done under conditions. These concern the existence of a European army market, to which the produced product will be channeled, and its export orientation, namely the emergence of European companies in the sector that will operate in the long term as an industrial entity with collaborations in all EU member states but also internationally for the distribution of their products and know-how in other markets, with a dual orientation to cover defense needs in war and in peace.
Specifically for Greece, analysts explained that the correlation between defense spending and economic growth is rather unclear, given the structure of the Greek economy, which is not based on heavy industry.
According to the data available so far, the participation of Greek companies in current armament programs is below 5% and the contribution of the defense industry to the country’s GDP is only 0.7%.
