【Summit Senior Figures Interview】Interview with Spiros Pengas ,Vice Mayor of Tourism and International Relations, City of Thessaloniki: Sharing Economy in Thessaloniki is Rapidly Developing

During the 2016 Chongqing Fragrant Hills Tourism Summit on September 20th, Spiros Pengas, Vice Mayor  of Thessaloniki was interviewed by media and answered the reporters' questions on the development of Sharing Economy in Thessaloniki.

Spiros Pengas said that Thessaloniki is not only an old city with 2,300 years of history, but a youthful city that has been rated as the European Youth Capital in 2014. "The residents in Thessaloniki are relatively young and they can easily integrate themselves into the opportunities brought by Sharing Economy, people can find out about the accommodations in Thessaloniki on Airbnb and we will further strengthen the cooperation with it in the future. In addition, we are now actively seeking to cooperate with other platforms. If that goes well, we are expected to be a Sharing Economy City in Greece by the end of this year."

Spiros Pengas thought that Sharing Economy is beginning to have a big effect on the global tourism industry. Many people will use some application software such as Airbnb and Tripadvisor on their trips and Thessaloniki will make more investments on social media and media platforms to attract more and more tourists.

Thessaloniki is the second largest city of Greece bordering the Aegean Sea, which has been in the European Cultural City in 1997. It’s Christian and Byzantine architectures were listed as UNESCO World Heritage sites. However, Chinese people are still unfamiliar with the city; this is also the reason why Spiros Pengas attended the 2016 Chongqing Fragrant Hills Tourism Summit. Thessaloniki was also one of the cities that bided for the 2017 Fragrant Hills Tourism Summit. "Moscow and Los Angeles are strong competitors and it would be a great surprise if we finally won the bid. We have gotten the chance to show our city, so I have been already satisfied with it."

Spiros Pengas hoped to make the public know about Thessaloniki through the summit. It is learned that Thessaloniki was once rated as one of the must-visit destinations by National Geographic in 2013 and was also honored as one of the Top10 Cities of Party by Lonely Planet. "We were managing to develop Chinese market in the past four years, the lack of direct flights is a serious obstacle for us and we will still work on it in the future. Thessaloniki is a city with history and modernization blended together as well as abundant tourism resources. We have been keeping close contact with WTCF and hope to make more Chinese people know about Thessaloniki through its platform and we will expand the cooperation in the future."

As the one of the founding members of WTCF, Spiros Pengas expressed his good wishes on behalf of Thessaloniki on the 5th anniversary of WTCF, "It’s a great honor for us to be one of the founder members of WTCF and we hope to have the opportunity to be elected as one of the members of the Council.And I hope that more people will feel the charm of Thessaloniki through t WTCF’s platform and I do believe that people who travel our city will certainly fall in love with it. "